


Steady as the Beating Drum

by Fiercest



Series: Steady as the Beating Drum [1]
Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Community: donnaficathon, DoctorDonna, Future Fic, Gen, Post-Canon, Suspense
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-08
Updated: 2015-09-15
Packaged: 2018-03-06 16:53:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 17
Words: 25,482
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3141770
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fiercest/pseuds/Fiercest
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For Donna Noble, it has been a two years since her accident and all weirdness aside; she’s having an okay time with it. Sure a cocktail of medication and constant occupation are what’s keeping her sane but who doesn’t have their crutches? New memories soon begin to emerge and someone claiming to be an old friend is desperately in need of her help.</p><p>Meanwhile the Doctor has just lost Clara and is in complete and utter denial. The Tardis, having none of it, sends him where he’s needed most.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Donna does Crosswords

**Author's Note:**

> Rewatched Donna's season a month ago and haven't stopped crying since. Must fix that, people have begun to stare.

Donna Noble sat on the hill near her family home staring up at the stars like they were a particularly difficult connect-the-dots puzzle. When she looked up, she knew she was supposed to be seeing something- find some sort of meaning in the spilled diamonds in the sky. But try however hard she might, she couldn’t fathom them into logic she could follow.

 

All her life he grandfather had babbled on and on about the stars. She could spot the Little Dipper and Alpha Centauri on a cloudy day if anyone had asked it of her- strangely, no one ever had. Beyond the names and constellations though, Donna could not shake the feeling that there was something bigger, greater and more Important (with a capital ‘I’) out there waiting for her.

 

She tried not to think about it as much these days, it made her head hurt.

 

“Alright Gramps, you think maybe you should turn in for the night?” She pulled her sweater tighter around her and worried her lip between her teeth.

 

“Getting weary in your old age Donna, my girl?”

 

“Oi, don’t you get sassy with me. I’m the one who organizes your pillbox every week.”

 

“And I greatly appreciate that Darling,” Wilf replied without averting his gaze from the lens of his telescope. “Whatever would I do if I forgot to take my unnecessary iron supplements at exactly noon every day?”

 

“Not much, let me feel important for a moment, yeah?” sighed the Most Important Woman in the Universe.

 

It was October 2010 and it had been almost a year since her accident. The whole world had been displaced and replaced, and she’d been none the wiser, knocked out cold by some kids who couldn’t properly drive their scooters. She woke up missing a year of her life.

 

Oh well, just another on of those Donna Noble stories.

 

Except…

 

 _(Right now_ she could feel it. The earth was rotating at 460 meters per second, revolving around the sun at 30 000 meters per second, in a solar system whirling around the Milky Way at 220 000 meters per second and being pulled in 46 305 different directions at varying gravitational pulls at minimum 13495 Newtowns and maximum 13858969999999999999999999—

 

Donna shook loose the train of thought and held her head in her hands. From her pocket she fished out a yellow pill bottle marked _methylphenidate_ (40mg). She dry-swallowed the dusty tasting pill and tried to ignore the surreptitious glances Wilf was throwing her way. Donna stood very still, breathing and trying her damnedest not to fly off the Earth as it turned too quickly for her to hold on. It took 20 minutes for the numbers to quiet, for the twitching in her right cheek to stop. For her mind to calm.

 

At first it had been very disconcerting. Her mother had insisted on her seeing a professional, who had diagnosed her with severe ADHD (among other things). “It’s actually very normal,” the psychiatrist, who’d had very kind eyes, had said. “Many women tend to remain undiagnosed until they’re challenged. If they’re as smart as you it’s likely not until uni.” Donna had balked. She’d never gone to University. And she was not what you’d call smart.

 

Most days she just wanted the leaping threads of her thoughts to just untangle; that pulling one didn’t mean yanking everything else along with it. Other days, when the medicine was working especially well she felt like a shark that stopped swimming; you stop and you die and such…

 

She found single-minded focus in puzzles and occupation. When it all got to be too much she did her best to find one single thing to think about and stay on that track. It was a precarious balance between crosswords and medication that kept her sane.

 

Multitasking was impossible, where it had once been as easy as breathing.

 

And she had never felt better. Where before she drifted, now she held course. Where she was slow, she was now quick witted. She felt _better_ than she was, like a whole new woman and people had started to notice.

 

Donna Noble; making the best of a hard situation. Who would have thought?

 

And it had all started when her agency had sent her to Uto-tech not a week after.

 

On her first morning Donna had signed at least thirty-something waivers, confidentiality agreements and contracts pertaining to the Secrecy Act. It was explained to her that anything and everything she heard was to go in one ear, out the other and into an incinerator or the word ‘Treason’ would be thrown around.

 

And then she’d met her boss.

 

Dr. Smith was not what she had been expecting. She was young, beautiful and very social- not at all your usual corporate ladder rung type. She chatted with Donna about herself, genuinely interested in the answers to her questions and wasn’t afraid to share the odd joke or two. She was a little off; manic and silly, but for the first time in quite a while Donna liked her employer.

 

She worked there for a month before Dr. Smith asked her to stay permanently.

 

And every morning since, Donna had a reason to get up in the morning.

 

* * *

 

The next morning Donna took the bus as usual. She found a seat next to a pockmarked teenager in a black cap and carrying a green apron.

 

Side to side she swayed as the driver stopped and started again, picking up the regulars along the route. She’d finished her first crossword of the day by the time she was halfway to work. For a while she just sat there staring at the black and white boxes with blue ink scrawling sketchy letters inside them, letting her mind roam.

 

She was jolted out of this period of reflection by the zit-y boy beside her.

 

“What?” she stressed in an annoyed tone. The boy, taken aback and slightly unnerved pointed to a man sitting directly across from her.

 

The man was very tall. His long legs were stretched out into the aisle and his pants were too short; exposing his lack of socks. White ankles jutted out above the tops of shiny black shoes. Eventually her eyes made their way to his face; creased by wear and beholden to bushy grey eyebrows threatening to curtain his eyes. Hm, and a full head of hair. If he hadn’t been staring at her desperately, like a bloody creeper she might have been flattered.

 

“Allo,” he offered with a wave.

 

Ugh. Donna rolled her eyes and did a sarcastic parody of his motion.

 

“I was just- uh…” _Out with it then!_

"Uh, four down is pentagon."

 

Donna was taken aback for a moment and looked down at her completed puzzle. "Agatha Christie's Dictaphone victim is a pentagon, is it?"

 

He didn’t seem like he had much to say after that, and his big eyes and pleading gaze was giving her an uncomfortable chill. She felt as if she’d seen him before and that it had not been a pleasant encounter. Perhaps in the year she couldn’t remember?

 

Either way, there were warning lights going off in her head and if there was one thing you learned as a woman in London it was to listen when your instincts told you that you had just encountered a Bad guy.

 

At the next stop she disembarked (eight stops too early) and raised her arm to hail a cab. She had no patience for nutters today, even vaguely good looking ones. Perhaps with her raise she might be able to afford halving her commute by moving out of her mother's. She'd been looking at a nice little flat with white walls that reflected the sunlight-

 

(Reflection: the change in direction of a wavefront, in this particular case 360-760 nanometers in length- visible spectrum- the ninth satellite of rexocolis 14 which was a naturally occurring prism that threw rainbows over the planet and colored the sky in different parts different hues, attributed to the planet’s different sort of atmosphere- the Earth’s atmosphere has a 78.084% concentration of nitrogen- breathable by Humans and Septuplepods on Euwedeka—

* * *

 

“Hallo Doctor,” Donna chimed that morning when she got in. As usual, her boss was already in. Try as she might, she could never quite beat her to the office and ceased trying after the first week. Dr. Smith smiled and waved in a fluttering way then returned to her drumming fingers and reams of paperwork.

 

The day progressed as normal for the first while, until the phone rang. “Dr. Smith’s office, Donna speaking. What can I do for you today?” she asked in a chipper tone.

 

There was silence on the other end. Even when she listened closely she couldn’t hear breathing at all. Donna tugged at the wire in the phone’s cradle seeing if it was still connected- it was.

 

“Hello?” she tried, staring into the speaker. “This is Donna Noble. Is anyone there?”

 

“Oi, I know you’re there. Speak up or I’m hanging up!”

 


	2. The Tardis is Always Right

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Doctor's day on Earth.

 

"Is there any particular reason you're being obstinate today or is it just that time of the month?!" the Doctor demanded of the Tardis as he was almost thrown from the controls.

 

The Tardis rumbled in its outrage. The deck around the console vibrated beneath his feet. Spanners shook themselves off their perches and clattered to the floor.

 

"You're right, I'm sorry. That was rude. Almost as rude as _the hunk of junk ship of mine not doing as I say_!”

 

In his mind’s eye the Doctor saw Clara’s stern face. She’d have pursed her lips and demanded he stop shouting.

 

A whir, as if to say 'when have I ever done as you've said?'

 

Behind him the door flew open, slamming against the wall with a resounding _bang_. "What's outside?"

 

More sassy whirring.

 

"Now don't give me that. I'm in no mood."

 

_‘One last adventure, you and me Doctor.’_

 

The lights flickered and the Doctor shook his head and decided it was likely best to just do as the old girl said. Happy wife, happy life and all that.

 

The doctor took a tentative step outside, expecting wonders, horrors, or both, only to find himself standing at a bus stop that smelled like 21st century London. Behind him, the door to the Tardis slammed shut, smacking him on the bottom and causing him to pitch forward into the street.

 

"Oi mate, what the bloody hell do you think yer doin’!?" Shouted the bus driver who'd had to break suddenly to avoid splattering him across the pavement. This body was new yet; it would be a waste to lose it so soon.

 

With a backward glance at the Tardis and a huff whistling through his nose, the Doctor searched his pockets for the Oyster Card that Clara had given him and boarded the bus.

 

Surreptitiously, he glanced around. It was the early bus. The keener businesspeople, nurses and teenagers with coffee shop uniforms made up the population of commuters. He took a seat and systematically parsed out each individual, wondering what was so special about this hour and the 206 busline.

 

The stormy blue of his gaze fell on the woman seated directly across from him. She was engrossed in the crossword on her lap and was chewing the cap of a blue ink pen into flatness. Her red hair glistened in the early morning sunlight and her lips were pursed in concentration. He wished she would look up so he could meet her eyes.

 

There, not two feet from his knees sat Donna Noble. In all the universe; time and space alike, here she was, looking the same as ever.

 

Was this why the Tardis brought him here?

 

"Excuse me," he found himself saying curtly.

 

Donna didn't look up.

 

He cleared his throat loudly. The entire population of the bus looked up, excluding Donna.

 

A teenage boy in a cap emblazoned with the Starbucks logo nudged Donna out of her reverie. She looked up at the youth, scowling. He nodded his head in the Doctor’s direction, which shifted Donna’s irritation onto him.

 

"Allo," he muttered with an awkward perfunctory wave.

 

Donna’s eyes widened and in the span of a moment narrowed into slits. She gave a sarcastically enthusiastic swipe of her hand through the air before rolling her eyes and returning to drumming the pen in a familiar beat against her lips.

 

"I was just, uh..." What exactly did he think he was doing? She was a friend from another lifetime entirely. It had been almost a hundred years for him since... Well, since. What good would this do? Did the Tardis think he was lonely? Was she telling him to quit his whining? 'Buck up, this isn't lonely. THIS is lonely. Now stop moping.'?

 

He'd been a wreck for the rest of that regeneration and beyond. The new man who had walked away had taken that baggage with him, and handed it off to good old Twelve it seemed.

 

Donna was still looking at him.

 

"Uh, four down is pentagon."

 

"Agatha Christie's Dictaphone victim is a pentagon is it?" She retorted before showing him her completed puzzle.  Roger Ackroyd written neatly in the boxes of 4-down.

 

At the next stop she jumped to her feet and got off.

 

The doctor remained in his seat until the end of the line. The bus terminal was in the center of the technological district and directly across from it was Uto-tech.

 

"Well. This is a bit of a letdown."

 

The familiar wheezing of the Tardis materializing sounded to his left. She had parked herself between two trees planted for the beautification of the city. "Great field trip," he told her with an eyeroll, "it could be worse, wouldn't someone's grave be nicer? More tongue in cheek I’d say. You know, I wasn’t moping. I do not mope. I can manage just fine on my own."

 

Wheezing from the rafters.

 

"Come along-ooooh," he smacked his lips and clucked his tongue, "those words do not taste right anymore. Onwards to the rift in Cardiff. Piloting yourself could not have been good for your energy stores."

 

Whizzing from the transducing anti-displacement mechanism.

 

"Oi, don't you get sharp with me. Who decided to nip from one end of the universe to Chiswick? It certainly wasn't me."

 

* * *

 

 

The doctor hadn't planned on exiting the Tardis. It was Cardiff after all. But the compunction of his earlier encounter made him restless.

 

He burst through the door into the open air near the docks where the old Torchwood headquarters had been. Directly in his line of vision was a tall cubic warehouse lined with puce metal sheets that rusted at the edges. Snow piled on the flat roof and fell like melted white chocolate down the sides. Written in enormous letters across the side of the building was _Uto-tech_.

 

“Hm,” hummed the Doctor. Perhaps the Tardis hadn’t gone sap on him afterall.

 

He couldn’t very well look it up in the Tardis database, lest he make them Ending the World a fixed point, a buttress on which the universe would stand and weep.

 

So the Oncoming Storm walked down the street to a café and stood imposingly over a teenaged boy’s shoulder until he relinquished his laptop to him. With a click he closed the tabs for reddit and the hidden tab for ‘Big Cocks’ then went to work.

 

The CEO was a Dr. Masie Smith. The article described her philanthropic past as an organizer for Doctors Without Borders and her meteoric and unlikely rise up the corporate ladder of Uto-tech to become the owner’s successor once the company became public. It was accompanied by a picture of a smiling black woman in her mid-thirties with a wide smile, full lips and strikingly large eyes.

 

Well she couldn’t very well be real now could she.

 

With a terse “Thanks,” he left the youth to his gross public indecency and made for a payphone.

 

The Doctor soon learned that it was a difficult thing to contact a CEO directly. Calling the corporate office gave him very little luck and the outsourced customer service representative seemed flustered at being asked _what exactly they did there_.

 

Eventually he gave up the reigns of the search to the Tardis’ superior ability to just telepathically know how to find exactly what he was looking for.

 

What he was looking for chilled him to the bone.

 

“Dr. Smith’s office, Donna speaking. What can I do for you today?”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Clara grew on me more and more with every episode in her season with Capaldi. I’m a little disappointed that I can’t keep her on as a primary companion for this story. But the plot goeth as it wishes… We’ll learn her fate at some point and it’ll play an important role later.
> 
> I’d really like to know what you guys think of the story. I’d also really like some help with the summary; if anyone’s got a better suggestion I’d really appreciate it!


	3. Girl Talk by the True North

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Donna remembers. And then like she'd dreamed it, she forgets all over again.

“I’m taking my lunch,” said Donna pleasantly, popping her head into her boss’ office. “Need anything?”

 

Masie surveyed her desk and stood. “Yes, definitely. Wait just a tick?” She typed out a quick two sentences before standing upright. She primly smoothed the wrinkles in her posh black skirt and made to grab her jacket and bag. “Done. Okay, lets go.”

 

Sometimes Dr. Smith did that; just dropped everything to share a coffee break.

 

They went to a cute little café only a few blocks east. It had flower boxes on the fence encircling the terrace and blue shudders on the windows.

 

“I’ve been thinking of going back to school,” Donna was saying. “Well, not ‘back’ exactly. Never went to school. But I think it could be good. I’d go at night of course,” she assured her boss, “And it wouldn’t really lead to anything. Just for fun. I could study something useless like Zoology or Geography. They offer special grants for people my age, so I could go for practically free! That would be a load off what with Shaun and everything. My mum thinks I’m daft. “What are you gonna do with a degree? _‘Piss away your money on something like that, you’re just asking for trouble. What if you have kid?’_ ” Donna mimicked Sylvia’s shrill lecture. “She’s still holding out hope on that one.”

 

“I think it’s great,” the doctor assured her. “Zoology could be interesting. You ever think of Astronomy, maybe?”

 

Donna was thrown for a moment. She felt strange, like she was supposed to know and remember something but wasn’t.”

 

“-because of your granddad I mean,” continued Maisie.

 

“Right, right,” said Donna, a little breathlessly. She shook her head, dislodging the imaginary cobwebs that clung to her thoughts. “So you think it’s a good idea?”

 

Maisie smiled widely and took Donna’s hands between hers. “I think it’s fab.”

 

“I’m so sorry. Here I am chatting your ear off and you haven’t said a word about how you’re doing. How’s the boyfriend?” Donna gave her a salacious wink. He’d met Dr. Smith at the office once or twice; very fit.

 

“No no, I like to listen. He’s fine. How are you doing on that front?”

 

“Ugh,” groaned Donna, “Don’t remind me. Shaun is being a real piece of work, let me tell you!”

 

_‘I will remember you,_

_Will you remember me?_

_Don’t let your life pass you by,_

_Weep not for the memories.’_

“What?” asked Donna while shaking her head.

 

“I said ‘I’m sorry to hear that.’” Dr. Smith was looking at her with great concern.

 

“Yeah,” she replied with another shake of the head, “got distracted by the music, it’s a little loud in here.”

 

The gentle ballad wafted in the air, drifting between the steaming food and the hungry patrons.

 

“Let’s get out of here, yeah?”

 

* * *

 

 

The thrill of adventure and mystery, the hope seeing his friend again wrought: a dangerous combination for a Time Lord fresh off loss. Dangerous for whom was yet to be determined.

 

* * *

 

 

When they got back to the office Donna was surprised to see a little girl sitting in her chair, spinning in circles and staring at a tablet. “Hallo.”

 

The little girl bobbed her head vaguely in her direction.

 

“Oh shoot,” grumbled Dr. Smith, “This is my boyfriend’s niece. I forgot her mum was dropping her here for the day.” She walked over and stopped the chair. “Will you behave for Donna? I’ve got a lot of work to do.” The little girl- aged around six or seven –bobbed her head, flipping her blond pigtails.

 

Dr. Smith immediately spun on her heel and headed towards the door, gesturing for Donna to follow closely, “I am sorry, I really am. I’ve got some meetings, can I just leave her with you?”

 

“Sure thing,” Donna agreed, much to the doctor’s obvious relief. “Go on, I can handle it.”

 

With mutterings of thanks, she did.

 

Donna suddenly realized that she did not know the kid’s name.

 

“Jane,” the child mumbled when asked.

 

Jane was quite able to entertain herself; there wasn’t much Donna needed to do for her. At every question she shrugged or grunted, quite a strange thing for a girl of seven. Donna herself had started babbling at age two and hadn’t stopped since.

 

They sat in awkward silence for the rest of the afternoon. Or at least, it was awkward for Donna.

 

“How’s school goin’?” she tried to ask, only to receive a shrug in exchange for her efforts. “How come you’re out today?”

 

“Hasn’t started yet.”

 

“What sort of music do kids listen to now?”

 

A shrug.

 

Eventually she stopped trying to connect to the unsettling little girl.

 

Around six Donna was on the phone with Shaun and his solicitor and had been for the past quarter hour, shouting obscenities at the pair. “If you think you can just keep it all, you’ve got another thing coming mister! I will make your life bloody miserable! I will tear your tongue out THROUGH YOUR EURETHRA!” thundered Donna. “Don’t you hang up on me! DON’T YOU-!” She slammed down the receiver and dropped her face into her hands and groaned loudly. She felt like screaming.

 

A polite cough alerted her to the presence of a fellow adult.

 

“Oh,” she quickly swiped at the frustrated tears in her eyes. “Hullo. You must be Jane’s dad.”

 

He was very tall and skinny, with hair that shot up and then swooped to the side in an artful curl. He had the faint shadow of stubble on his jawline and a dimple in his chin. _‘Skinny streak of nothing,’_ Donna found herself thinking.

 

“Uncle,” he corrected. “We’ve met before, I’m Dr. Smith’s bloke.” Donna relaxed a little at his joking manner.

 

“Oh god I am terrible, shouting and swearing in front of a kid.”

 

“Nah.”

 

A beat of quiet, broken only by the vague humming coming from Jane’s headphones.

 

“Joshua Gregory,” his handshake was firm and warm. “Creditors?”

 

“You could call ‘im that.”

 

* * *

 

 

 _‘Ugh, Nerys.’_ Donna positively rolled her eyes at the empty kitchen. _‘Shame it’s her who has all the good gossip.’_

 

‘And he’s leaving her!’ Nerys was saying over the phone.

 

“NO!” a sickly pit of guilt settled in her stomach. She suddenly wasn’t hungry for the TV dinner, which was being heated in the microwave. “For that redheaded tart?”

 

‘Well it serves them both, they weren’t _happy_. Then again I don’t think Sherry has been happy a day in her life!’

 

“Poor thing,” Donna sighed. ‘ _That’s unlike me.’_ Perhaps it was because it was the very similar situation she’d been in for months.

 

‘I say, those pieces of shit deserve each other. Sherry can move on now, maybe actually get a life!’

 

It occurred to Donna that Nerys was absolutely right. Weird.

 

‘Oh, I’m sorry Donna. I shouldn’t have said anything so soon after Shaun dumping you like rubbish on the side of the road.’

 

“Thanks Nerys,” Donna grit through her teeth. ‘ _There it is_.’ “He did not dump me. It wasn’t like we were going steady and he’d ditched me at prom. We were married.”

 

‘I don’t really see the difference.’

Truthfully, Donna wasn’t sure she could anymore either.

 

The microwave beeped and Donna took her food to the table while Nerys nattered on about their friends’ troubles. She tuned her out and briefly perused the page the paper was open to. She opened it up to the September book recommendations. She’d found that the harlequin romance type books were the best for killing her ‘episodes’ but sometimes the odd existential hipster bullshit worked too. 

 

**-**

**‘A Journal of Impossible Things Vol. 2’** , by Verity Newman (There was no way that name was real was there?)

_Adapted from journals found in her grandmother’s attic, Verity Newman weaves a tale of adventure, love and heartache based on the life of a school teacher; John Smith (August 1875— November 1913)._

_‘The Doctor’ is a tragic hero; an alien from another world who travels time and space in search of anyone who needs help. He is cursed to seemingly live forever, go on endless adventures and lose every friend he makes along the way-_

 

Donna leapt from the kitchen chair and fell to her knees in front of the bin, hurling into the noxious smelling receptacle. She groaned like something undead, her heart beat wildly between her shoulders and she’d broken out in a cold sweat.

 

‘Donna? Donna!’ Nerys trilled through the telephone.

 

“I’ve gotta pop off now, ta.”

 

‘Donna-!’ she cut the line off without remorse.

 

“I know that story,” she whispered to herself through a curtain of hair. She was on all fours now, trying to find purchase on the cold tile, trying to find something to focus on other than that stupid story, about some stupid man who did stupid, terrible things! The bird brained, foolhardy prawn! Always thinking he knows what’s best. Alright? Sure, she was alright, if in his stupid Martian language alright meant-

 

“Donna? Donna, love, are you alright?” Sylvia flew into the room and held Donna’s face in her hands. She stared into her eyes with such utter panic that for a moment Donna was honestly flattered. “Donna, what’s happened?”

 

“I-?” What had she been thinking about? Like a dandelion in the wind, whatever it was had flown right out of sight, into nothingness.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks so much for reading everyone! I’m really enjoying writing this. It’s a shame Donna’s day in the sun was so long ago, not much of a fandom left behind now. But I’m sincerely enjoying reading the fics that I can find! If anyone’s got recommendations for me that’d be great.
> 
> Let me know what you think! (And to take a page out of Lilac Summers book) ‘Comments are like a cozy picnic on the beach. Except instead of a blanket, you’re sitting on the Tenth Doctor, and instead of eating fishy smelling sandwiches, you’re sucking face.’


	4. The Doctor Makes a House Call

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Eleventh doctor pays Donna a visit.

His eleventh regeneration had been more foolhardy than his preceding or current self. He was every bit the madman in a box he’d claimed to be, the raggedy doctor coming unhinged at every moment; never quite closing the door on sanity, but never walking all the way in either.

 

In his darker moments—and they were dark—he could be more destructive than any other man he’d been before. After losing Amy and Rory he’d gone into a tailspin he couldn’t pull out of, nothing would rouse him from the stupor of regret. For a man who didn’t like endings the Doctor encountered many.

 

In one of his fouler moods he visited earth, circa 2010.

 

He was fresh with the loss of the kind of man who stands sentinel for a thousand years, for a woman who imagined reality back into existence… These were the only terms in which he could think of them. The Doctor could not bring himself to remember more than what they’d done. He refused to think about _who_ they were.  If he did- well, if he did then in a weak moment he might actually…

 

The man in the bowtie with the child-like disposition had an inner darkness that receded more and more with the Ponds’ presence. And when they were gone, the dam burst; depression washed over him like waves on the shore, taking just a little more of him away with every sweep.

 

It was in this state that 2010 called to him, the pied piper of his nightmares.

 

“Hello there, Wilf!” The Doctor exclaimed with a big smile on his face. He adjusted his bow tie and counted to ten in his head to see if the smile would last. “Still working the pavement old chum? Sylvia not worn you down about retirement?” He realized that he was puffing his chest out too much, that he looked like a cartoon trying to be manly. He deflated with a whoosh, his posture falling inwards. “Alright, okay. Yes.”

 

A shaking hand ran through thick sandy locks, trying to smooth out the disarray. It had been quite some time since he’d left the Tardis. Human interaction seemed to be a long forgotten skill.

 

Another deep breath and the Doctor turned away from the mirror in which he’d been practicing acting like a functional person. “No time like the present… so to speak!” The Tardis hummed her approval.

 

He stepped outside into the alley near Wilfred’s newspaper stand. It was a sunny late August afternoon in bustling sweaty London.

 

He pretended to peruse the magazines while studiously not making eyecontact with the proprietor. _‘Ok, any second now. On three, speak… one… two…’_

 

“Look lad, I’m real sorry but I don’t sell the kind of magazines you’re looking for,” Wilf sighed, as if he’d had to explain this to a dozen people today.

 

“Sorry?” The Doctor’s eyes came into focus, he’d been pretending to stare at women’s magazines.

 

“Generally when a young man is staring at Cosmo that long they’re hintin’ for me to offer some dirty mags.”

 

“What? No, oh no no no, Mott, Old Man it’s me! The Doctor!”

 

“Doctor?” He laughed sharply, and threw his arms in the air in celebration. “Doctor! Is it really you?” Wilf came out from behind the stand and hugged the young-looking man. “Look at you! I didn’t recognize ya!”

 

It occurred to the Doctor that no living thing had touched him since Amy had slipped through time. And how this body loved contact! The warmth of the old man’s embrace was a comfort.

 

“Are you alright?”

 

“Yeah, I’m alright.” ‘ _The Time Lord sort of alright, maybe.’_

“Do you…” Wilfred seemed reluctant to voice whatever his concern was. “Donna’s coming by any moment with her young man, do you need to… go?”

 

“No,” sighed the Doctor, “She’s never seen this face.”

 

As if on cue, she announced her appearance with a shout. “Oi Gramps! Did you tell Mum we’re coming to dinner this week? That was right unfair of you, you know!”

 

“I refuse to incriminate myself!” Wilf shouted back with a guffaw.

 

“Watch it, you!”

 

Beside Donna trailed a very tall man with broad shoulders. He had creases of stress in his forehead and smile lines. _‘Shaun_ ,’ his memory supplied.

 

“Hello Wilfred,” greeted Donna’s husband cordially. “Who’s your friend?”

 

The Doctor nodded his head in his direction. “John Smith,” he leaned forward with a big stupid grin to shake the man’s hand. “Shaun Temple, am I right?”

 

“Yeah,” he enthused while vigorously shaking the Doctor’s hand. “How’d you guess?”

 

“I met a John Smith once, looked nothing like you,” Donna piped up, not even looking up from her phone’s screen. At the shocked silence she finally made eye contact, looking bored. “Never forget a face.”

 

“No, you certainly do not. Me ‘n John go way back.”

 

“I thought you said your name was John.”

 

“It is! Funny world innit?”

 

Blank looks and rolled eyes from Donna.

 

The Doctor bounced back on the balls of his feet. “Anyway… Mott over here was just telling me about the wedding.”

 

“Yeah,” Donna’s eyes twinkled as she geared up to talk about her favorite subject, “Little under a week ago.”

 

“A week!” ‘ _A week?!’_

“No honeymoon?”

 

“No,” Donna’s tone turned flat and the familiar look of frustration and exasperation (at his stupidity), “Can’t afford one quite yet.” He could almost hear her teeth grinding together. “What are _you_ getting judg-y for, you twit? With that you ratty secondhand hipster clothes?!”

 

Shaun placed a placating hand on Donna’s arm, “Easy love.”

 

And in that gesture the Doctor saw her entire life stretch out in front of her; the happy life she’d spend with this man, who for all accounts seemed very sweet.

 

He shouldn’t have come.

 

There were dozens of timelines that he could see behind Donna, dozens of could-have-beens that tangled together and frayed and diverged. Some threads were knotted, others had dead ends. They all lead to this life. And only one lifetime stretched in front of her now.

 

He _really_ shouldn’t have come.

 

* * *

 

 “Donna, sweetheart, how are you feeling?” Sylvia’s uncharacteristically soft voice gently woke Donna from slumber. She awoke to her mother stroking her fringe off her forehead. She felt sweaty and sluggish.

 

“Mmyeah, mum what’s going on?”

 

Sylvia bit her lip and glanced around Donna’s room, “You were ill last night.”

 

“I was? I don’t remember that.”

 

“That’s ridiculous, you got sick all over my kitchen!”

 

“I did?”

 

“You did!”

 

Donna groaned at the high pitch of her mother’s voice, she hid beneath the blankets. “Sorry.”

 

“You were also…”

 

Something about the tone she was taking made Donna reemerge. “What? What was I doing?”

 

“You kept asking for ‘the Doctor’.”

 

“That is very _weird_.”

 

“Darling…what does it mean? What were you dreaming of?”

 

“Not sure, I don’t think I was dreaming about Dr. Smith.”

 

“Dr. Smith?”

 

“Maisie Smith, _my boss_. It’s like you don’t even listen!”

 

“It’s not my fault you don’t tell me what’s going on in your life Madam!”

 

“I _do_ , you just don’t listen!”

Inwardly, Sylvia’s heartbeat was slowing to a normal pace. She wasn’t remembering. She was only sick, only dreaming. Sylvia could almost convince herself of that if not for this sudden bout of convenient amnesia.

 

* * *

 

 In his present, the Doctor took the time to think about it all. He sat down on the jumpseat of the Tardis, facing the controls, knowing that though he felt the all encompassing need to rush; he did indeed have a time machine and time was never of the essence when you could pause it for indeterminate amounts of time.

 

When he looked at Donna he should have seen her life stretching out in front of her; the timeline of her life moving ever forward, just like it had when he’d seen her so many years ago. He _should_ have seen the zigzagging nonsense behind her.

 

Instead he saw nothing; no timelines converged around Donna Noble, no future. He didn’t even see an end. For Donna Noble, apparently there was only ‘Now’.

 

* * *

 

“What are you watchin?” Donna asked. Jane was spending the day at the office again.

 

Jane shrugged, but she took out her headphones and turned the screen towards Donna. Oh well, progress was progress.

 

It was the movie with the fish. The blue one was gazing into the camera with terrible sadness.

“It’s over Dory,” said the orange fish with the sad old eyes. “We were too late.”

 

“No, no you cant! Stop!” Anxiety crept into Donna’s heart, “Please don’t go away. Please? No one’s ever stuck with me for so long before. And if you leave…” it was suddenly very difficult to breathe, “When I look at you I can feel it. And I look at you and… I’m home. Please. I don’t want them to go away. I don’t want to forget.” Donna did the same thing when she was upset; she kept shaking her head as if telling the bad things in the world ‘no’ would stop them from happening.

 

“I’m sorry, but I do,” said the orange fish in a cutting voice.

 

Donna felt a nudge at her elbow. Jane was handing her a tissue. She reached up to touch her face, only to realize that she had been crying.

 

_I don’t want to forget._

_ I don’t want to forget. _

****

**_ I don’t want to forget. _ **


	5. Donna Dreams of White Rooms

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Doctor is stuck in Cardiff and accosted by two people who aren't terribly happy with him.

The Doctor exited the Tardis, fully expecting to be just outside the London branch of Uto-tech. What he found was the fishy air of the docks of Cardiff, and an unfriendly smirk on a familiar face.

 

“Is it bad that I’m feelin’ pretty good about how damn old you look?”

 

“Mickey, not the time.”

 

“Martha Jones…” the Doctor gulped.

 

“That’s Martha _Smith_ to you, mate,” Mickey sniped accusingly.

 

“Smith- _Jones_ ,” growled Martha, not looking terribly thrilled. Her arms were crossed over her chest and her hip jutted out in that familiar brassy way of hers.

 

The Doctor held up his pointer finger and pressed his lips together, “Just a minute.” He then stepped back into the Tardis and slammed the door on their noses.

 

“DOCTOR!” he heard Martha shriek, accompanied by banging on the door.

 

The Tardis growled angrily, like a car revving in neutral.

 

“Shut up.”

 

Levers were pulled, dates and coordinates reset and the Doctor was on his way.

 

He opened the door once again, expecting London, only to be faced with Martha and Mickey- both seething.

 

“No.”

 

Martha erupted. “What have you got to say for yourself?! You break the universe again and _you don’t even call me_!” she slapped him repeatedly on the arm, “What. Is. The. Matter. With. You!?”

 

“Oi! You’re so violent!”

 

“I get that way when I relive the same day THIRTEEN DAYS IN A ROW!”

 

“What.”

 

“Yeah,” Mickey piped up from behind his wife, “what’s up with that?”

 

“Oh shut up Mickey,” groused the Doctor, “What _is_ going on?” he mumbled under his breath, much to Mickey’s exasperation. He quickly turned tail and launched himself back onto the Tardis- the Smiths trailing behind.

 

* * *

 

 

Donna felt as if she were in a desert; dry, parched and too hot. She drifted in and out of lucidity, weaving about between comprehension and oblivion. Her head pounded as if it had been smashed with a hammer. When she opened her eyes, the room was too bright and colors blurred like a mirage on the horizon.

 

“Oh Donna, you’re brilliant!” someone was saying. And yet she had not a single clue from which direction the voice was coming; it seemed as if it were everywhere at once.

 

She blinked the world’s fuzziness away and found herself still in her office, but also not. It was still too bright; like morning light being let in after a hangover. Or heaven in the movies. And in the very center of the room was a glass column surrounded by bits and bobs. Inside the column something pulsed up and down to the rhythm of a heartbeat. She felt very warm.

 

Donna rubbed the sweat off the back of her neck and then rubbed that off on her trousers. She stood up and walked closer to the column, that upon closer inspection looked like a control desk in a space travel movie; except this one had a boot screwed heel-side down onto a lever and a beanie hat with a propeller that appeared to be bronzed.

 

 _Where am I?_ She tried to say out loud.

 

“Brilliant Donna Noble, knew I kept you around for some reason!” There was no door, but Donna had the sense that he’d entered the room right behind her, not a moment ago.

 

“Yeah, I’m normally a real drag,” she found herself replying in a teasing manner.

 

She could see the man through the glass column, smile distorted wide by the refraction of light.

 

“Never say that, even joking!” he tutted and walked around to meet her, lovingly stroking the dashboard as he walked. “Another world saved by Smith and Noble. What _will_ we do next?”

 

“Probably get into lots and lots of trouble.”

 

The man was taller than her, but not by much. He was also obscenely skinny, with hair that stuck up in front and big brown eyes that crinkled at the edges, pulled by his enormous, manic grin. He even bounced when he walked. The man was utterly ridiculous, and yet, Donna had rarely felt more appreciation and care for a person. She could tell all that, she could recall his smile, and yet she could not really see his face properly. It was distorted somehow, like she was wearing specs with smudges, or like she was only getting bits and pieces.

 

Even as she thought this, Donna knew it was all a dream; that this wasn’t real and neither was this strange affection. Still, it felt more real than a lot of things these days…

 

The man casually leaned against the console and flipped a switch.

 

“So, big universe out there. Where would you like to go?”

 

Donna could not move or speak beyond the script already set out by this strange dream, but she was not afraid. She smiled on the inside even as the dream body she inhabited did the same. “Why don’t we let the Old Girl choose?”

 

“Alright then, go on.” The skinny man with the kind smile stepped aside and gestured grandly at the column. _Tardis_. _That’s not even a proper word._ But she knew it all the same.

 

Donna found herself stepping forward and hesitantly flicking switches and pushing buttons. She glanced up at the skinny man nervously. “Doctor…?”

 

“Bang on, keep going.” More buttons and lights flashing and then-

 

She lurched off her feet, the world tilted sideways and she was falling. ‘Doctor’ as he was apparently called grabbed her hand and held on tight. He’d managed to grab the lever with the boot. “What did I do?” she screamed and her throat burned.

 

“Nothing! You didn’t do anything.”

 

“No no no no, I want to stay-!”

 

“Donna-”

 

“No, no, please. Please no.”

 

“Donna, do you trust me?” his eyes were sad, his expression unreadable. She felt her grip on his fingers slipping. “Look at me. Donna, do you trust me?”

 

Calm settled over her, her body went slack. “Yeah. Yeah, Spaceman. I trust you.”

 

“Donna Noble. I am so sorry. But we had the best of times. The best.”

 

And then he let go.

 

She was pulled away, flying through a door that had suddenly opened into bright white lights. “I’ll find you!” he screamed, still reaching for her. “I will fix this!”

 

And then a blue door slammed shut.


	6. The Doctor Loses His Patience

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which the Doctor's ex-companions are quite fed up with him.

Donna felt an overwhelming pain in her heart; grief and loss with which she was unfamiliar. It was a fresh wound in her psyche, ripping her apart and making tears well and burn in her eyes. Whoever this was, he was important. He was everything. 'The Doctor' was someone she clearly cared about very deeply and yet she wasn't sure if he was even real! Perhaps someone she knew in the year she forgot? What fresh hell was this?! Loving a dream. Well, bollocks to that! Her patheticness had reached a new level, clearly and Donna was not comfortable with heights.

"Donna," a familiar voice beckoned from behind her closed eyelids. "Donna, are you alright?"

Her eyes fluttered open, to be met with a face haloed in fluorescent light. He had a long skinny face and a pointy chin, his hair stuck up in the front in messy brown disarray and his big brown eyes were staring at her worriedly. She had the sense that she knew him.

"Oi, hands!" she shrieked, once she found her bearings. She scrambled away from Dr. Smith's boyfriend with frantic desperation.

"I wasn't-!" Joshua groaned, rolled his eyes and rubbed his face. "You hit your head Donna. I was just making sure you were okay."

"Sure you were, mate."

Joshua sighed and got to his feet. He then bent down to try and hoist her to her feet. From this vantage point Donna could see how tall he was, and looking up at him like this triggered something in her memory. "Oi! Hands I said!"

"I'm trying to help you," he grunted, still tugging.

"Skinny streak of nothing that you are, what do you think you're goin'a do?"

Donna got to her feet and brushed herself off. Her pantsuit was wrinkles and covered in dirt from the unvacuumed carpet.

"What are you even doing here?" she demanded and glanced at her wristwatch. It read five o'clock. "Did I sleep the whole day away?" Donna directed the question at Jane, much to Joshua's exasperation.

"I would not call passing out and having a seizure 'sleeping'."

"Yeah, well who asked you?!" Donna threw this rejoinder over her shoulder as she gathered her things.

"Come on then," Joshua lay a hand on Jane's shoulder and grabbed Donna's elbow. "Lets get you some coffee, and I'm not taking no for an answer."

Something about a man getting her coffee struck an uncomfortable chord with Donna, but still the inexorable pull of her boss' boyfriend's fussing ensured that Donna could not turn down the offer.

* * *

 

Meanwhile, the Doctor had at the very least discovered what was happening. Not- as per usual- it helped him solve anything. "We're stuck in a quantum helix."

"You could just say time loop," Martha said with a roll of her eyes. "I've seen Groundhog Day."

"No, a time loop is something totally different."

"How?" cut in Mickey.

"Shut up, I'm trying to explain. We're still moving forward, but time is twisting in a sort of coil. We're reliving the same day but the days themselves did actually happen. Time is still moving, except in this spot. The three of us, with traces of time energy-"

"From travelling on the Tardis," Mickey deduced.

"-are the only ones aware of it."

"So what do we do, Doctor?"

The Doctor pursed his lips into a thin, wrinkled line. He narrowed his eyes as he stared at empty space thinking. "Has anything come through the rift since you've been stuck?"

Martha and Mickey exchanged looks and simultaneously shrugged at the Doctor. "Sort of," Mickey mumbled. This elicited a very dramatic eyeroll and six skinny feet of indignant Gallifreyan pushing past them to leave the Tardis.

"Times like this, I miss Clara." He said out loud for the first time since she'd left.

"Times like this remind me of why I left," sighed Martha as the door closed between them. "They also remind me of why the prat needed me." She grinned gaily at her husband and nudged her head at the exit. His answering nod and grip on her hand made her heart race with excitement as they left the Tardis to once again run with the Doctor.

* * *

 

Donna didn't know how it had happened, but she was sitting across from her boss (and probably best friend)'s boyfriend and laughing harder than if she were watching Graham Norton. He may have been a tosser, but he was a funny tosser.

"And then she goes, 'Will you take a look at the tile grating in our bathroom? You'll absolutely die!'"

" _No._ " she laughed. "I've never met a man who went so far as to  _pretend_  they were gay to not sleep with me. Had a couple boyfriends who actually were though. You sure you're not?"

"You wouldn't mind breaking it to Maisie for me would you?"

Donna laughed so hard she almost choked on her coffee. Some dribbled down her chin and down her shirt. "Oh shit."

"Here," Joshua reached out with a napkin and dabbed at her chest, much to her wide-eyed consternation. He didn't even seem to register the action as odd. It didn't feel like a come-on?

She coughed and snatched the napkin from him, dabbing at the stain herself. She hurriedly changed the subject. "Is Jane always this way?"

The girl was sitting between them silently staring at her iPad, with earphones in.

"Yeaaaaaah," he replied with a sigh. "Kids, amirite?"

Donna patted the girl's knee in sympathy. Jane looked up for a confused moment before returning to her movie.

"Anyway, is everything alright with you Donna?" he laid his hand over hers and looked at her with empathetic eyes. And for once, Donna honestly believed someone cared about the answer beyond reasons of pity.

Her whole manner deflated. "Y'know, as alright as they can be."

"Do you want to tell me about it?" He looked like the man in her dream, the one she trusted to find her and save her in that strange room that reality could not touch. His big sad eyes were familiar in a way that not many things in her life were these days. And his need to help was a salve.

And just like that the floodgates opened. "It started a couple years ago. I woke up to find a year had passed and I couldn't remember any of it. And everyone just kept looking at me with these sad eyes like 'poor pathetic Donna'-"

…

> "-And sometimes I just know things that I should have no way of knowing. Like once, when I was still with Shaun, he pointed out this article in the paper about lady Vikings. And I was all "so wot?" and he said "I dunno, s'just interestin' that's all" and it was the weirdest thing but I could swear I'd already known that! I thought maybe there had been a series about it on the telly but when I googled it later- nothing! Isn't that-"

…

> "-So I've been on medication for ADHD, depression, bipolarity, sleeping pills, and sometimes I feel like it hurts more than it helps y'know?"

…

> "When I was out, I had this dream. I was in a strange room and a man was there. I think he was my friend. I think I knew him once."

…

For the next few weeks Donna and Josh met on Tuesdays and Thursdays for after-work tea or lunch, always chaperoned by the sensory-deprived Jane. She rarely spoke more than a word to either of them during these excursions, so it was as if it were just the two of them.

They had developed an easy rapport; jumping back and forth between teasing and chatting. He made her laugh and he was a good listener.

And who was Donna to turn her nose up at a friend when these days she had so little in common with the ones she'd had before?

* * *

 

The Doctor stood in front of the rift with Mickey and Martha in his wake. He had been rambling on to himself for a solid fifteen minutes and had not bothered to explain a word to his two former companions. His only acknowledgement of their existence were occasional mumblings about unobservant apes. If he only bothered to ask them…

Mickey sighed, tapped his foot and checked his watch. Any second now.

Martha abruptly called the Doctor.

"What is it now?" he asked, deigning to try to hide his annoyance at least a little for Martha's sake. He was determined to not be as much of a twat to her as he had been last time. He stopped pacing and gesticulated at her wildly with impatience. "Well?"

All of a sudden a hunk of metal shot out of the Vortex and hit the Doctor in the back of the head.

"12:47 and twelve seconds. Like clockwork."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Feedback is always appreciated!


	7. Maisie Insists

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Donna's birthday on the Tardis

"Hi there Doctor," chimed Donna as she entered the office at eight on the dot on Monday morning. "I brought us a spot of lunch today, had some leftovers from mum."

Maisie laughed and accepted the proffered Tupperware. "Thought you were free!"

"I may have my own flat now but I will never be free from Sunday dinners."

They good-naturedly chatted for a little while longer before going about their day.

Later, a little before lunch, Dr. Smith got off the phone and was off like a shot into the outer office. She sat herself on the edge of Donna's desk and fixed her with a penetrating stare.

"Oh shit. What did I screw up?" cried Donna. She anxiously began looking through her notes. Typical. And she'd been handling herself to well lately, she was even taking her medication regularly!

"Nothing, you just forgot to tell me something  _extremely important."_

"Oh no." Donna felt sick.

"It's your birthday tomorrow?"

_What._

Donna flushed bright red even as her heart hammered in her chest. "Where did you hear that?"

"Got it from Joshua," triumphed Maisie.

This made Donna inexplicably uncomfortable. "I don't remember telling him that." Then again, they talked so much who could remember?

"He says you mentioned your last birthday at lunch the other day and he pieced it together."

There was something very very weird about this conversation.

"We're going to take you out. Do you have plans tomorrow?"

Unless Donna planned something herself, her birthday usually passed with little incident beyond whatever sized deal her grandfather decided to make about it. This year she had neither the energy nor inclination to set something up. "Free as a bird," she sighed.

"Perf, bring something nice to the office and we'll go from here."

"What about Jane? It'll be Tuesday." Jane spent every Tuesday and Thursday in the office.

Maisie waved her hand, untroubled. "Don't worry about it. Sounds alright to you though?"

"Yeah, sure. I'd love to." She knew she sounded less than enthused but the Good Doctor did not seem to notice.

* * *

_2009 (but not)_

Life aboard the Tardis was hard to keep track of. In the beginning Donna had kept a calendar in her room where she'd made arbitrary marks to count out the days, but she'd quickly lost track of days passing at all. She sort of just slept when she was tired- which wasn't often or regular. She was always too excited and anxious to move on to the next new world or time.

So when she woke up one morning to find the Doctor standing over her she screamed. Just a little.

"WHAT ARE YOU  _DOING_  IN HERE SPACEMAN!?"

"Brought you breakfast," he said, untroubled. He had a big stupid grin on his face and looked oddly well groomed.

"…why."

"Weeeeell," he drawled, "thought it'd be a nice thing to do for your birthday."

"Do you celebrate birthdays on Mars?"

"For the last time, Donna: I'm not-" he sighed, "you know what? Never mind. Lots to do, big day planned." He placed the tray he'd been holding on her lap and leapt into bed beside her.

She covered her mouth in an effort to not slay him with her morning breath. "Thanks." All her favorites. She hadn't thought he'd been paying attention. She took a bite of strawberry waffle and positively moaned in pleasure. "Didn't know you could cook."

"I'm 904. I've figured it out."

"It's kind of hard to eat with the bed bouncing," she pointed out, bumping shoulders with him.

"Sorry," he had the decency to look a little chagrined. "I'm just excited."

"Where are we going?"

This was his favourite part, "First, beach day. No trouble, no running. Just a warm beach with an ozone layer intact enough that you won't turn into a to-mah-to," he enunciated, chuckling with good humor. "Then dinner on a satellite orbiting above a ringed planet.  _Then_ … guess."

"I'm not guess-"

" _Las Vegas_!"

"Which one?"

"What do you mean which one?"

"Well there's a New New New New New New New York. One was in France. Another was a whole other planet. Another, a solar system. So I ask again; which Las Vegas?"

"Weeeeell, there's actually only one Las Vegas. In 2202 it exploded."

"Wot?"

"Big mess, not a pretty affair, but no one wanted to invest in another one. It got a real bad reputation after the 2040 mutated syphilis outbreak."

Donna hummed in stunned acknowledgement; sometimes it was better not to ask.

When she was done eating and the Doctor had finished picking at her leftovers she got out of bed and stretched. The Doctor didn't move.

Donna sighed for what felt like the hundredth time that morning and began tapping her foot. He still wasn't getting the hint. Oh well, sod subtlety. "You gonna stay here while I change into my swimsuit?"

"I-I-I- um, no. No no no. I'm going to um-" his eyes were wide with fright and astonishment. In all honesty, the best gift he could have given her was this chance to poke fun at him. For a 907-year-old alien he could be such a kid. And such a bloke.

"Don't hurt yourself Spaceman. I'll meet you in the console room."

* * *

Back in the 2011 Cardiff quantum helix in which the Doctor was 'presently' stuck, his patience was dwindling by the minute.

"So I take it that this shoots out of the vortex every loop," he all but growled.

"Actually," Martha corrected. " _Something_  shoots out of the vortex every loop."

The Doctor looked down at the piece of metal that had beaned him in the head. "You mean you don't know what this is?" he asked with contempt. "It's a discombobulator."

"I  _know_  what a discombobulator is. It's just not always a discombobulator. Yesterday it was a holophone. The day before it was just junk. We could have  _told you this_  if you just  _asked_." The litany of frustrated insults went unspoken.

"Well… shut up."

"Is that your new thing? 'Shut up?' I almost like the French better."

The Doctor chose to ignore her allusion to catchphrases. Sometime he just did not understand himself and the decisions he had made in the past. (Usually he felt this way about his wardrobe, I mean really, celery? But sometimes he remembered the stupid things he used to say. 'Timey wimey' for one thing. He shuddered to think!)

"So the rift on our side opens only at exactly 12:47 and twelve seconds. Different items fall through, which means there is change on the other side of the rift. So the quantum helix is spatially finite. Oh that is good! Very good! So we just need to see how far it springs."

"So if we drive far enough we'll eventually leave the time loop?" asked Mickey

"It's not a-!" The Doctor huffed and deflated, "No, if we leave the field then we'd be out of sync with the rest of time."

"And what does that mean?"

"You know how sometimes people think they see ghosts?" Martha chimed in. "It's that, poor souls just a moment out of time with the rest of us." She shivered. "I saw some things when I was working for UNIT."

"And if we were outside the loop when it came around again?" asked Mickey, shifting his gaze back and forth between his wife and the madman.

"We'd be out of sync forever," confirmed the Doctor.

"Great! New plan then."

Fiercy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next time: Donna comes to a startling realization and Martha and Mickey are sick making.


	8. Donna gets her swerve on

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Doctor and company find out what's going on at the center of the chrono helix.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry about the long wait, here’s an almost double length chapter to make up for it. And it’s plot heavy! (Yes, even with that title).

_2009 (but also not)_

Days on the Tardis invariably ended with Donna and the Doctor panting on the floor of the Tardis, sweaty and sore. 

Birthdays were no exception.

“Really?!” Donna demanded, running a hand through her damp hair. “Why am I not even the slightest bit surprised? I can’t take you anywhere.

“I dunno, I like to think we haven’t gone stale,” joked the equally moist Doctor. “Is this the part where you tell me we need to put the spice back into our marriage?”

“Please, you prawn. I am _never_ boring,” a breathless laugh. “But seriously, is that what we’re doing now? Going along with people’s idiocy?”

“Why fight the inevitable?” he took her hand and squeezed. “Because someone’s _inevitably_ going to think that I mean. Not because I’m irresistible or anything, although it has been said before-”

Donna snorted. “Don’t hurt yourself there, Doctor.”

“Vegas, _Queen_ and a cult of humans infected with alien sex pollen. Just another day at the office, eh Donna?”

Running. There was an unbelievable amount of running involved. How had her life come to this?

“Yeah. By the way, I’ve got a bone to pick with you about all that.”

Fine, so she’d ripped her dress when he’d slammed the Tardis doors to keep the sex-crazed lunatics out. But it was all for the greater good-! Oh. Oh no. She meant... 

The Doctor sat up against the wall of the Tardis and ran a hand through his hair, giggling nervously. “Yeah? Didn’t like your birthday gift?”

Donna joined him, leaning against his shoulder. “While it’s probably the nicest thing that anyone’s ever _attempted_ to do for me, I have to ask; how _exactly_ did getting Freddie Mercury to write a song about me turn into _Fat Bottomed Girls_.”

Either way, he knew he was in trouble. So he just wiggled his eyebrows at her and put on his most mischievous and lascivious grin. “Well, you make _my_ rockin’ world go round.”

“Shove off you.” 

* * *

 

 _2011_ _(The relative present…)_

“Shove off Mickey, I’m trying to work something out here.”

The Doctor unwound a wire from around what appeared to be a plunger box.

“Seriously, we have gotten nowhere in the past three days. You’ve just been walking circles around Cardiff, staring at your blippy thing. The only thing that’s changed is the _hernia_ I got from trying to get the bloody Tardis onto a dolly.” The objective being to lug the big blue box to the center of the chrono helix field.

“It’s not my fault you were too dim to use the fork lift.”

“How was I supposed to know there was a bloody forklift in the bloody Tardis?!”

“’Kay Mickey, enough now.” Sighed Martha whilst glaring up at the sky, begging some deity to smite her on the spot. Or to smite the Doctor. Apparently her husband regressed ten years in maturity when he was around.

“Thank you Martha.” 

“Do not thank me Doctor, I do it for my sanity, not yours. Now what do you need?”

He thrust the old timey wooden plunger into her hands. “Take this, I’ll ring you in an emergency. Don’t pick up, just push it.”

“…It’s not going to blow up the Tardis is it?” she glanced at the beloved blue box and bit her lip.

“No, it just looks like that. It’ll generate a counter pulse, the exact radius of the chrono helix’s field, cancelling it out. Wait no, changed my mind.” He took the plunger from Martha and thrust it into Mickey’s chest, knocking the wind out of him. “You take this. Martha, you’re coming with me.”

The couple exchanged a look and Martha shrugged. “Where are we going?”

“We’re going to see what Uto-tech is hiding.”

* * *

 

Donna examined her reflection critically. Her hair was down and fell in tousled, artful waves. Curling it had made her realize how long it had been since her last haircut. She honestly couldn’t even remember. She wore a royal blue dress she found in the back of her cupboard and her makeup was minimal. She kept trying to smooth the fabric at her waist, as if pressing on it would press in her fat. She sucked her teeth in displeasure at the fit.

A glance at her watch told her she’d keep Maisie and Josh waiting if she kept on like that, so she let the matter drop.

 _Did I forget anything?_ She wondered, and grabbed her pills, just to be safe. It had been a while since she’d had a bad day, but you never know. It couldn’t hurt, at least. She dry swallowed one with ease and put the rest in her clutch.

Out the door she flew, stopped only by a critical Sylvia’s terse comments about the length of her hem.

“Mum. This isn’t 1969 where not wearin’ stocking’s makes me the town tramp!” Donna argued through her frustration.

“No, getting married twice and neither sticking does!” Sylvia shouted back. Her eyes immediately bugged out at having mentioned the Lost Year. Capitals ‘L’, ‘Y’.

But Donna was not in the mood to pick at her mother. “Look, I just want a nice dinner with my friends, can you _for once_ just leave me be?!” she ended on a high note.

Sylvia opened her mouth but was interrupted by the doorbell.

“That’s weird,” Donna mumbled, “Thought I told Maisie to just give me a ring when she’s outside.” 

The door swung open to reveal Josh standing on her doorstep, looking dapper in a dark blue suit.

“Hallo there Birthday Girl.”

“Hi,” replied Donna, uncomfortable with the prospect of him being seen by her mother. “Come on then.”

He stood there with a big dumb grin on his face.

“What now?”

“Oh Donna, you look lovely,” he complimented- shit eating grin still in place.

“That is well bad Josh, don’t poke fun.”

“I’m not!” he insisted, “shall we?”

Donna rolled her eyes and took his proffered arm. “Don’t wait up!” she shouted into the house and tried not to acknowledge her mother’s quickly approaching (the snoop!) footsteps.

As they approached his car Donna noticed that Maisie wasn’t in the passenger side. “Where’s the doctor?” she joked.

“Oh, she’s just delayed a bit. She’ll meet us at the restaurant,” Josh assured her.

Maisie had actually arrived at the restaurant before them and greeted them with an enormous toothy smile and hugs. “Happy birthday Donna,” she gushed.

Good old Maisie. Sweet, beautiful and who apparently gave a shit or two about Donna. Excellent judge of character, that one!

They took their seats and Josh immediately launched into a one man show of mockery; from making fun of the waiters uniforms, to the pretentious names for food (“It’s just a posh way of saying chicken and mashed potatoes!”) to the froo froo couples all around them.

“Shut it, you prawn, the waiter’s coming!” Donna reprimanded, not really minding all that much.

After their orders were taken the night picked up even more. Donna regaled them with stories of temping; all the ridiculous people she’d met, the strangest ways she’d been told her services were no longer needed (“And then they brought in a cake that said ‘Thanks Dona’ WITH ONE ‘N’!”). Josh talked about travelling, old schoolmates, (“Utterly mad, he was! We would get into all sorts of trouble, skipping out on lessons to run around the Wastelands by ourselves.”). Maisie smiled prettily and absorbed it all.

It was terrible of her, but for long stretches of time Donna forgot she was even there. It was so easy, with Donna sitting in the middle of the two at a square table and Josh dominated the conversation, gesticulating wildly and excitedly; describing adventures he’d been on, with his good mate John, but mostly alone… Donna had subconsciously turned completely to stare at him, her head supported by an elbow on the table. “Wow,” she would whisper at the appropriate times. “You didn’t!” she would gush at scandalous tellings. 

Joshua was the most fascinating man she’d ever met. He was wild, ridiculous, and most of all familiar. He was so like the man in her dreams. He haunted her in the pleasant way that childhood friends do. You think of them when you least expect it and the warm breathlessness of nostalgia grips you for just a moment before you go about your day. When she met him, the connection had been almost instantaneous. People like that; the ones that know you right away… They don’t come along everyday do they? And when you find them…

When you find them you what?

Donna suddenly felt very sick. The cheery grin turned to a lopsided frown. Josh wasn’t hers. Josh was Maisie’s. Sweet, successful, wonderful Maisie, who gave her a job and listened to her problems, who was probably the best friend she had in this solar system.

Donna felt a foot run up her calf.

She stood up sharply, a curtain of hair obscuring her horrified face. She almost upended the table with her urgency. “I need the loo!” she shouted, too loudly and raced for the back of the restaurant.

Waiters rolled their eyes and groaned internally. Some people just didn’t know how to act in public! And those friends of hers didn’t even seem surprised. They just sat there with placid expressions. She must do it all the time.

In the bathroom Donna took in quick, harsh gulps of air. She stared her reflection down, daring her counterpart to contest the oncoming lecture. “You are not in love with that man. What do you think this is, Eastenders? You think he’s going to leave Maisie _for you_! Fat, thick, ill Donna. Can’t hold a marriage together for more than a minute and you think _that_ is interested. Maisie is your friend. After everything she’s done for you. Shame on you! Stupid! Stupid! Stupid!”

She could feel the panic attack coming on and reached for her purse, but her hands were shaking so hard that it spilled all over the floor. On her quaking hands and knees she scrambled to pick it all up.

There was a knock on the door.

“OCCUPADO!” she shrieked.

The knocking persisted, tapping out an awfully familiar rhythm…

“I SAID-“

The door opened and in stepped Josh. _I could have sworn I locked that._

“This is the _ladies_!” she shouted, hands planted on her hips in an effort to seem menacing and not at all like she’d just been having the worst epiphany of her life.

“Yeah,” he said, slightly breathless too. And in one swift move he was across the room and placing one hand on her lower back the other at the back of her neck.

And then he _yanked_.

They came together in a beautiful, calamitous collision. His clever tongue that could talk from dawn to dusk and vice versa danced with hers. He backed her up against the counter and all inhibitions and objection left her. She instinctually lifted herself onto the marble countertop to get a better angle and wrapped her legs around his waist as he sucked, nipped, licked and-

It had been so so long.

* * *

 

_Cardiff_

 

They went in through the loading docks, slipping through just as a truck pulled away.

Martha took the lead, drawing her gun and peering around corners before running in quick spurts. The Doctor followed at a more languid pace. “Where are we trying to go?” she whispered. It echoed against the linoleum floors, but it didn’t matter. There didn’t seem to be anyone else in the building.

“Power source. Down below.”

They took the lift to the first basement level and switched to the stairwell for the subsequent three sublevels. It seemed to just keep going on and on, deeper and deeper.

“What do you think’s going on Doctor?”

“The Tardis kept bringing me here.” And the Tardis always knows best. “So there must be something going on that’s worth checking out.”

“You’re not usually so paranoid. Is that this regenerations thing?”

“Thing? What are you talking about? I don’t have ‘things’.”

“You do, like that weird high pitched thing you used to do with your voice.”

“I have never done any such thing.”

“Sure Doctor.”

They finally reached the deepest level, Martha held her gun, poised and nodded her head at the door, signaling to the Doctor that he should go first and she would cover him.

He rolled his eyes at her and nodded, “One, two, three.”

With aplomb he waltzed through the door and loudly proclaimed, “Who’s in charge here?”

Martha nearly slapped her forehead. The idiot. Guns were being drawn, threats were being shouted. Martha came out of her hiding place and fixed the man in the center (who seemed to be in charge) in her sights. “Okay, everybody calm down. Let’s not be hasty about this.”

The man in the center wore a nice tailored suit. He was very tall, had dark brown hair that stuck up in front and a long skinny face. He also seemed very familiar to Martha; as if they’d met before. He stood in front of a control panel that was connected to a glass dome, where a storm seemed to be brewing within. Purple clouds swirled and dissolved and reformed, like they were in a blender. Blue lightning forked across it in intervals.

“Listen,” said the Doctor with his _Negotiation Voice_. “I’ve got someone set to dispel this whole thing the moment I give the signal. Tell me what’s going on or I’ll pull that trigger.”

Was he… giving the weird underground mad scientists an out? What the-

“Oh my dear Doctor,” proclaimed the man with a flourish. “You have been naïve. You don’t even know that you’ve already lost, or rather; _who_ you’ve already lost. ”

The man’s grin split across his face like a ripped seam, it was jagged, crazed, a little manic. And familiar.

“Say it,” commanded the man. “You know how this goes. Say. My. Name.”

The Doctor fell to his knees, knowing that all was wrong with the universe and finally, finally knowing why. “Master.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> um... dun dun dun. Thoughts?


	9. The Doctor loses his cool

"Now back on topic!" exclaimed the Master with glee. He leapt down from the platform and strode right up to the Doctor, who had gotten to his feet once again. The men surrounding them, cocked their guns, ready to fire at the slightest provocation. And as Martha had seen with her own eyes, all it took as a stray bullet to kill a Time Lord.

"What is the dear old Master doing  _in Cardiff_?" he wrinkled his nose and rolled his eyes at the name. "Any guesses? You, with the gun." He pointed at Martha.

"We  _have met_ ," she muttered, exasperated. "I walked the bleeding Earth for Pete's sake."

"Yeah, sorry about that. All his companions kind of blur together after almost 1300 years."

"Blimey you're old!" gasped Martha. "Were you that old when I travelled with you or has it been a while?"

"Do you really think that's the pressing issue right now?"

"Yes yes yes," the Master clapped his hands and ran a hand through his flyaway hair. "I'd just like you to know that it's too late."

"Too late for what?"

"Why, for Donna of course!"

The Doctor inhaled sharply and narrowed his eyes. His hands which had been held up, fell to his sides and clenched into fists. Martha's eyes widened, her glance moving back and forth between the mortal enemies. "Donna, but she's-"

"Silly, dim and unsuspecting. But most of all: lonely. And lonely is a dangerous thing to be in the universe."

What happened next was something Martha had never seen before, not from the Doctor. Certainly not from this one. The Doctor leapt at the Master and punched him in the face. Two uniformed men with guns rushed forward and restrained him. He was pulled off the Master kicking and shouting incoherencies, which, now that she thought about it, must have been Gallifreyan.

"Doctor!" she hissed, "What is this, a schoolyard scuffle? Am I going to have to mend scrapped knees and a split lip next?"

He ignored her. "What did you do to her?! What did you do?"

Fear struck a blow to the Doctor's chest. Anything the Master could have done had already doomed her, he knew. But he had to know. Had he let her burn? Stood there smiling as she wasted away in overwhelming fear and crushing memories? Or had he struck her down like he had so many others. He wondered if Donna had died not knowing the truth. He wondered if Donna died unhappy.

"Nothing fatal," assured the Master in a way that made the Doctor wish it had been. "She's still useful."

Maybe it was coarse and indelicate, but Martha had learned to resort to sass when she was backed into a corner. She blamed the Doctor for this. "Great, chew the scenery some more there. Blimey, we get it. You're evil. Moving things along now now." Er, maybe she'd gone too far. But this regeneration left a considerable babbling vacuum. "You know, he kind of looks like you. The old you."

He was tall, skinny, had a long face and a pointy chin. His hair stuck up in front.

Oh no.

"And she's got it! Look at that,  _look at that_. She's good, you should keep her."

"No thanks, I've got people who depend on me."

"Don't worry Doctor," the Master circled them like a shark. "She hasn't remembered, yet. But somewhere in her mind is trust, trust for the skinny Doctor who could show her impossible things and made her simple, useless life worthwhile. Humans are so easy to exploit, remind them of a loved one and they'll gladly stumble over themselves to get a taste." The way he said that made the Doctor want to hit him again.

"You can't have any real interest in her. Whatever you wanted her for as about me. Well you've got me. Now leave Donna Noble alone."

"Actually," the Master quirked an expressive brow and smirked. "For once, Doctor, this is not about you at all."

Donna and Josh returned to the table. Josh seemed perfectly relaxed, Donna was stiff as a board and Maisie seemed none the wiser.

She buttered her bread and chatted a little more animatedly than previous and for all the world looked perfectly happy.

Donna felt sick.

The rest of the meal passed with Maisie carrying the conversation and Donna staring into her full plate.

"Happy birthday to you!" someone began singing, which startled the redhead out of her stupor. Her eyes widened when they fixed upon a waiter carrying a tray laden with a candle-topped cake.

"Happy birthday dear Donna, happy birthday to you!" Maisie and Josh chimed together.

The flaming cake was set in front of her, she'd never felt more on the spot on her life.

"Make a wish," Maisie prompted.

 _I wish this had never happened._  And then Donna blew out her candles.

"I actually have some news for you Donna," Maisie seemed so excited. It's such a shame Donna would have to quit and move to Timbuktu. "You've been with us for a few months now and you do such great work. I was wondering if you'd like to stay on permanently."

Oh no.

"Would you like that?"

Words failed her, "I-I don't know what t-to say!" she stuttered out. "I can't think of a single reason to say no."

She and Josh made eye contact.

She could think of a thousand, but none that she could give Maisie.

* * *

 

There was a man, not so very long ago, who was very handsome and very charming. He became one woman's everything, faster than she knew, and in six months, it all came crashing down.

Lance was not the first to betray Donna Noble, he was not the last. And he was by no means the most important.

When the Doctor came into their lives, he was in no place to be angry on behalf of a stranger's heartbreak. Sadness would do just fine then.

On all of the adventures they went on the Doctor never had the opportunity to be angry on Donna's behalf. Terrible things happened to her and him both in those times, but the anger never manifested; there was no one to direct it at. How can he be angry at a library and a little girl?

Anger does not cover the loathing he felt for himself when he betrayed Donna's wishes and took her memory.

But now, standing before his childhood friend, who cackled at darling, none-the-wiser Donna's expense, vitriol bubbled up in his chest. Donna Noble, brilliant, empathetic, infuriating Donna Noble, with her big threats and tirades and her bigger heart, was meant to have a good life.

She was supposed to be left alone to finally be happy. She was supposed to live to the ripe old age of 115, surrounded by adorable Shaun and Donna clones, loved, cared for and free of worry and regret.

The Universe  _owed her_. The Universe owed no one apparently, not even the person who'd saved it.

The Doctor was now good and  _properly_  angry.

"Master, you have no idea what you've done."

Serenity was placid on the Master's face. "I think you'll find that I know a lot more than you think I do." He licked his lips. "Didn't taste much like sardines."

Martha wrinkled her nose, completely missing the joke, but still on the same track.

The Doctor swallowed and pushed the buried memory of the 20th century kitchen deep down where he kept all his unresolved issues with women: in a little box marked 'not to be revisited'.

"How do you know about that?" he grit, peeking inside the mental box, just a little. Just enough to remember that he'd had no idea what to do with his hands.

The Master smirked, "That specifically? You told me."

When? Well, that was complicated, because it hadn't happened yet.

Well. Everything got a hundred times more convoluted with that notion introduced.

They were meeting the Master out of order, which could mean any number of things, but chief among them was that  _he_  was the only one who knew how this whole thing ended.

* * *

 

 _"Tardis?! That's not even a proper word!"_ "Agatha Christie didn't go around surrounded by murders. Not really. That'd be like Dickens surrounded by ghosts… at Christmas! _" "Just trust me, jump!"_ "I should do that more often… the detox, I mean."  _"You were brilliant."_

Donna awoke in the middle of the night with a start. She took deep, heaving breaths and stared up at the white ceiling, counting heartbeats. She was sweating, but felt very cold.

Slowly, she got out of bed and donned a soft fleece dressing gown before putting on a pair of trainers. She grabbed her mobile and slid down the stairs as silently as she could manage.

Wilf was asleep on the sofa, in front of the telly when the door slammed (it stuck otherwise and refused to shut except in the hottest summers). He jolted to his feet and stumbled for the front door. He threw it open to find Donna skittering off into the night. He called her name.

She turned around for only a moment, her eyes were haunted. "Granddad. I remember. I remember the Doctor," she gasped before disappearing into the darkness.

"Donna!" Wilf shouted, uncaring if he woke the neighborhood. "Donna, come back!"

The old man tottered inside as quickly as he was able and practically lunged for the kitchen drawer to the left of the dishwasher. Inside were old receipts, bills and the Doctor's phone number.

The ansaphone picked up with a click, "Doctor! It's Wilfred Mott. Doctor, something has happened to Donna. She remembers you."


	10. The Master exposits a lot

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Martha fills the sass vacuum and Donna is lied to.

Donna attacked the door with a barrage of attacks. And she didn't stop when the door opened. Her knocks and slaps assailed the tall, skinny man behind it with the righteous force of a woman wronged.

"You," slap, "STUPID!" slap, "SKINNY!" slap, "SPACEDUNCE!" and a sharp kick to the shins. "WHAT HAPPENED?!"

"Donna!" the Master exclaimed, warding off the assault to the best of his ability. "This is not cute, what are you doing?"

"Doctor, what did you do to me? Where did you go? Just because you get all sad last-of-the-Time-Lords and all that bollocks, does  _not_  mean you get to take away my memories and drop me off where I came from." She spat this in his face so hard that she seemed to exhaust herself with the emotional effort it took.

"Donna, what do you remember?" asked the Master, tentatively.

"Midnight," she took a step forward and for the first time laid kind hands on his cheeks, cradling his face. "They were wrong about you."

"Oh Donna," he smiled crookedly. "I know now, I know how wrong I was. I found you; it's all right now. I promise." He was saying all the things he knew that she desperately wanted to hear from his old friend. The Master knew that he had her now; he had succeeded. All that was left was moving on to the final phase of his plan.

"But I swear, I didn't do this. Someone took you from me."

"Who?" she gasped, laying a hand over her heart. It was beating so fast, adrenaline surged through her veins.  _What_  in the hell had happened to her?

"The Master." There was a long dramatic pause where he let his declaration sink in. "That's not all… Donna, I need your help."

"Me? What do you need my help for?" Donna demanded. "And what's the Master got to do with anything?" the Doctor had only mentioned him in passing, speaking of old memories from their days spent underneath two Gallifreyan suns. Martha had tetchily mentioned walking the entire ( _bloody_ ) Earth once or twice…

"I don't know yet. He's the one who took your memories," he stroked his chin and appeared deep in thought. "How many times have I said 'Don't wander off'?" the git joked.

"Why should I listen to you? Apparently you make a habit of losing track of your companions! How many do I make?"

"That's not the point," the Master cut in, eager to get back to the point. "Donna, I need your help. Do you understand?"

"I don't see what I could do. I'm just a temp from Chiswick." She nudged him with her elbow.

The usual anticipated burst of "Brilliant!" did not come; the man who she thought was the Doctor rolled his eyes.

"Must be serious," she misinterpreted. "What do you need, Doctor? Of course I'll help you."

He smiled.

* * *

The real Doctor was ready to tear his hair out. He had neither the time nor patience for their usual toxic brand of banter. Martha didn't mind; she was having a grand time filling the sass vacuum.

"You go around seducing earth girls now? Long way to fall from total planetary dictatorship," Martha was saying. The Doctor was glad he'd brought her; she was very bright. Keeping the Master talking was the trick with him. Too bad that he was in no mood for the self-restraint necessary to do it himself.

The Doctor continued to seethe over the implications of the conversation. It's all very not-at-all set in stone, but in the current timeline  _he_  at least got through this. (And apparently had a heart to heart with Koschei about his vast array of issues with women). But it was not himself who the Doctor was worried about.

Enough was enough.

"Enough is enough!" hm. Alright… that could have been put better. The Doctor held up Martha's mobile and tried to look calm and threatening. "If you don't tell me what your plans are, I'm ending this loop. All I need to do is press this- wait." He looked closer at the device. "Martha, this is a smart phone."

"So?" she demanded in exasperation.

"So I need your code, could you-?" he rolled his eyes and twitched his entire body in the process before whipping out the sonic. "It's fine, alright." A buzz and it unlocked. "There. I have someone on the other end of the line that will end this loop at my say so," he threatened through clenched teeth.

"Do it," The Master dared. He licked his teeth and grinned like the Cheshire Cat.

"I will."

"I'm telling you to."

The Doctor narrowed his eyes and dialed the most recent number. It rang. And rang. Then went to voicemail.

"Hold on." He held up a finger and rang Mickey again. This time he picked up.

"Hello? Did it work?" he asked.

The Doctor slumped. "No. Did you push down the plunger?"

"Yeah."

"All the way?"

"Yeah Doctor."

"Did you accidentally unplug it maybe?"

" _No_. It just isn't working. What do I-?" The Doctor hung up the phone, cutting him off.

Yards away, the Master was smirking in a self-satisfied manner. "Hate to say I told you so."

* * *

Donna followed the Master back to the office. It was the middle of the night and the milling denizens of the London hub were missing from the familiar scene. It was eerie, like visiting a famous person's grave. You know a lot about this man or woman who used to occupy space in the world, and are visiting the space they now occupy in the ground; it's all downright weird.

"Ok, now that I've had time to think about it all, I'd really like to give you a good kick. I mean, what exactly do you think you're doing, waltzing on in here and not explaining a damn thing."

Inwardly, the Master rolled his eyes at her chatter.

"Like who's Maisie? Is she your companion? Because excellent choice."  _And now I feel a lot less weird about what happened between us._ Donna bit her lip and contemplated the awkward situation. She'd all but shagged her best friend.  _Well shit._

Meanwhile, the Master was mildly put out at having to actually tell Donna the truth about any aspect of his plans.  _'Companion… that would have been better.'_  But he couldn't very well change their story now. She might realize something was amiss.

"No, er, Maisie's… a little hard to explain. It'll make more sense when we get there."

"When we get  _where?_ "

Just then, they arrived at the R&D department's back anterooms. He typed in a six-digit combination (which she mentally catalogued, as all assistants do, whether they admit it or not) and the doors opened with a  _whoosh_  of changing air pressure.

Inside, there was no one. It was circular and at the very center was a familiar console, reminiscent of the Tardis. It had a disestablishing mechanism bobbing up and down within a glass column. The words came to her, but Donna could find no meaning in them. She felt afraid and a little lost in this vast room full of half-familiar alien devices.

"I think now's a good time to start explainin'," she huffed, trying to cover up her unease.

"Sure, of course," the Master conceded but did not elaborate.

"Any day now sunshine."

"Right!" he snapped back to his place in front of her so quickly that he almost fell ankles over shoulders. "Questions?"

"Yeah. WANNA TELL ME WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON?!"

He reared back and blinked. The Doctor actively chose to take this one with him? Or did she bully him into letting her aboard?

"Er…"

And then after some feigned need for prompting the Master explained.

"The Master separated us and kidnapped you. I searched everywhere, but when I found you, he'd already made you forget me." He made a great show of looking devastated, drawing on his brushes with the Doctor's sentimental side. "I've just been travelling since then."

Donna's head tilted to the side as she regarded him through narrowed eyes. The Master expected a little yelling about that, before he could eventually get to his point. "I'm glad you found someone," she said with sincerity. "You seem happier, alright." If he hadn't already established a strong link to her mind he wouldn't have known about the hurt she was hiding. He didn't know why she bothered hiding it- for the Doctor's benefit he supposed. The Master had never bothered to hide his emotions to spare anyone's feelings.

"I've been alright," he assured the ape. "I wouldn't have come back, but I need your help."

Donna bit her lip and nodded as if she understood, she took his hands in hers. "Anything Doctor, what do you need?"

He leaned in very close; close enough for them to share breath. He held steady eye contact and pressed two fingers into her left temple. "I need that big brain of yours."

She snorted. " _No_."

"I'm serious."

"Ha!"

"Donna, I need your help to bring back Gallifrey."

She stopped laughing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've been writing the Master in the the 10th Doctor's voice. Does that come off as odd to you guys? 'Cause I feel like it fits.


	11. It had to be Donna

_"Well I hate to say I told you so-_

"-But I told you so," the Master gloated. "Don't worry, it matters so little when you get out of this loop that I won't even bother trying to stop you. But it is nice to know that you fell for one of the most classic blunders."

"Start any land wars in Asia lately?" Martha snapped at the Doctor, who rolled his eyes. Honestly. Sometimes his head was so chock full of trans-millennial pop cultural nonsense that it was a wonder that there was room enough for the mechanics of poly-dimensional travel!

"Oh come on! It's no fun if neither of you ask me to elaborate."

"What do you mean 'it doesn't matter'?" the Doctor indulged.

"Because it's all already happened."

"Good job I have a time machine and you telling me something,  _does not_  make it fixed!"

"No, but trust me when I say that I've done my best. You'll let me know if it was good enough." His self-assured smirk made Martha nervous. What could he have done to Donna in a matter of days? How long had they been in the loop really?

"What do you want, Master? Whatever it is, you don't have to involve Donna or anybody else. I can help you."

"This you is much less sincere than the last; not sure I like you all tall, grey and stern."

"Tell me what I can do." As if the answer had ever been that simple.

"There's nothing I want from you Doctor, not even your pain. Like I said: I need Donna, and I have her. Problem solved."

A dark look overtook the Master's features, the vaguely familiar lines of his face morphed into an ugly smirk, he looked up from under hooded, dead eyes and pierced him with an accusatory glare. "Any minute now," he whispered.

* * *

"What is it?" Donna whispered with awe in her voice.

"It's- well- I haven't quite named it yet," the Master rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly. "The long of it is very dull and full of words you definitely will not understand, the short of it is that it makes your thoughts reality."

Donna's brow knit together in her attempt to process the meaning of this. "Okay, and you want me to bring back Gallifrey by… thinking about it?"

"Well, yes."

"But I've never even seen it!"

"What's that go to do with anything?"

She sighed, "Well, you big moron, how am I supposed to think about a place I've never seen or been to. Or even heard anything about!"

"Well, they wore very strange shoulder hats- or are they technically necklaces? -and there were two suns."

"Why can't  _you_  do it?" she demanded, skeptical of his true motives. "What aren't you telling me?" worry chewed at her heart. What was wrong with the Doctor?

"I can't," he sighed, slumping his shoulders for effect.

"Well  _why not?_ "

"You see, my brains a little  _full..._  at the moment."

"Sorry?"

He hadn't really expected her to ask this many questions. He sort of missed the days when the Doctor's companions followed him without question. That would have made this easier.

"Something happened and I regenerated."

The questioning look on her face indicated that this had no meaning for her. "Remember when I said I was very very old? Well it's because I regenerate. If I die, my body will regrow itself into a whole new person. I change." She seemed to understand this, though she seemed very dumbstruck. He went on. "Something went wrong and when I regenerated I wasn't just one person."

"Like you had two heads or something? Or like that special in the Sun about conjoined twins?"

" _No_ , not like that," the Master rolled his eyes. "It wasn't just me in my head anymore… I was a lot of different people at once. Think about what it would be like if your own head got crowded with a bunch of voices that weren't yours and you no longer had complete control of your actions."

Donna did think about it. The strange thing was that she didn't have to imagine what that would be like. She felt that way every day. She knew things she should have no way of knowing, she dreamed things that made little sense. Donna nodded.

"I created this machine so that I could sort ooooof," he smacked his lips, "take them out of my head and make them real."

"Did it work?" she gasped.

"Well, you've met Maisie and Jane haven't you?"

* * *

"Oh, look at that. Time for me to pop off." The Master had no watch to look at, but since when did a Time Lord need that to time an exit? "I'll see you in a few weeks Doctor!" he sort of twiddled his fingers in a gesture of goodbye and reached into his jacket pocket. When the Doctor and Martha saw the vortex manipulator they both lunged.

But it was too late. The Master had disappeared.

They were left lying in a heap where he used to be, surrounded by cloudy-eyed men and women in uniforms standing up straight and stiffly. They gave the pair no notice with their puppet-master gone.

"How can he do that?" grunted Martha, pushing herself up onto her knees. "I thought if you leave the loop you go out of sync."

"You and I would," the Doctor explained. "But the Master created the loop, only he knows exactly how time was designed to pass inside it."

"And there's no way for us to figure it out?"

"No, there is," the Doctor pursed his lips in a grim, wrinkled line. "Doesn't matter much if we're too late." He drew his knees to his chest and bit his thumb, sinking deep into thought. He made a ridiculous picture; long skinny limbs jutting out at oddly bent angles, curled in tight as if in defense.

Martha sighed and found her feet. She offered her friend her hand and tried to be sympathetic to his maudlin tendencies. "Come on Doctor, it'll be alright. If you think Donna's not going to throw a wrench in his plans then you must be going senile. We should hurry so we can see the show. Don't wanna miss Donna Noble chewing him up and spitting him out, do we?"

His bony fingers grasped her long slender ones. She heaved him to his feet. "No," he supposed. "Can't have that."

"What the hell do you mean  _Maisie and Jane_?!" Donna shrieked, aghast. "You mean they're not…real?"

"No no, they are! That's the point," the Master help up his hands in a placating gesture. "You see, this machine," he patted the chrome siding fondly. "Makes the imagination real. They were fully formed in my mind, they're as real as anything now that I've made them."

"You had  _people_  running around in your  _head_!?"

" _Yes_  Donna," the Master rolled his eyes, growing impatient. "And now they're not."

"So that thing makes stuff in your head real. And you want to use it to make Gallifrey real again." He nodded a confirmation. "So why can't you do it? I don't know anything about Gallifrey? How am I supposed to imagine it?"

"Like I said," the Master turned his nose up proudly, "My mind's a little too full to focus on it enough. I can implant the memories in your mind so you can do it. Easy!"

"Well focus really isn't my strong suit lately either." Donna hugged herself and rolled her eyes. It was all happening so fast; the Doctor coming back, retrieving her memories, and instantly on another adventure! They didn't even get to talk about anything, not really. He was doing what he always did: skirting the issue by distracting them with something new and exciting. He'd kissed her- like he'd meant it. Were they really not going to talk about that either?

Well, perhaps there were more pertinent issues at present than Donna's strained libido and confusing feelings. She felt a little shame at even giving credit to the thought.

Gallifrey was his home. He'd sacrificed it for the universe and even still, she knew he would do anything to bring it back. She couldn't screw this up for him.

"Why does it have to be me?" she asked, "Can't you just put it in anyone's head? I'm sure Martha would help, or one of your recent companions? What's so special about me?"

The Master had prepared for this question; Maisie had had more time to sift through Donna's memories, but he'd had the time to really mull over the implications. The Doctor marveled at this strange silly human, in a way that he could never really understand. But he could replicate it, so who really cared?

"Donna Noble, you are brilliant. It had to be you. Big mind like that, you create entire universes around you, whole parallel worlds! Remember the library? Small minds live small lives. Only you can make it real. I know you can do this. I  _need_  you to do this." He gripped her shoulders with long skinny fingers and stared deep into her eyes. The hazel of his irises gleamed in the fluorescent light. He leaned down until their noses were a hairsbreadth apart. "Please," he begged, searching her face.

She didn't think. Of course she didn't have to. Here was her best friend begging for her help, asking her for greatness. If greatness was what he needed then she could fake it, easy. Anything to take his pain away.

"Okay, I'll do it."

* * *

"What now Doctor?" asked Martha, as she led him up the flights of stairs.

He puffed behind her, "You're sure you want to stay with me now that the Master's involved?"

"What sort of daft nonsense of that, of course I do." At the next landing she whipped around and pointed a finger in his face. "I don't know what your deal is but we are friend. That doesn't stop because I haven't seen you in-"

"About 800 years."

"800 years, really?" She shook her head, and brought herself back on track. "It doesn't matter. I'm with you Doctor." She took his hand and grasped it tight. When you run with the Doctor you learn that no one needs hope, promises and protection more than he.


	12. The Tardis does Donna a favor

"You're kidding me right?" Mickey grasped his wife's shoulders and pleaded with the puppy pout that he knew made her laugh. "It's that easy?"

"Apparently," she shrugged and leaned her head on his shoulder. "As far as adventures go, this one hasn't been terribly eventful. Doctor, next time you wanna head to Omega-12, the universe's biggest safari or whatever, let us know?"

"How did you know about that?" asked the Doctor, so perplexed that he pulled out of his reverie.

"I was only joking, Omega-12 is the universe's biggest safari?"

"Well, it's very large. And you can go on a domesticated housecat safari. If not, there's always the rodents."

Martha pouted this time, "Sometimes the universe stinks."

They were in Martha and Mickey's flat, waiting for the day to end. The Doctor looked incongruous sitting at their kitchen table, tapping his fingers and toes to an annoying, unheard beat.

"Doctor, do you realize what you're doing?" asked Martha.

He knocked four times.

Looking aghast, he flexed his fingers and glared as if to scold the digits. "Don't you do that!" he shouted at the palm of his hand.

"Oh no, the Doctor's lost it." Mickey shook his head, "No wait, that implies he was once sane."

Martha sighed for the umpteenth time that night and took the Doctor's hand in hers. "It's going to be alright Doctor, I swear."

"Yeah," her husband chimed in, "It'll be fine. And I've met Donna, the Master's the one who should be scared."

Well… she was very shouty. But the Doctor knew that despite everything that Donna was, and probably still is, the Master had already succeeded. She didn't even know he was coming. Was it lucky he'd found her? Just in time to be too late.

* * *

Donna hadn't seen the Doctor coming. Who could predict a pretty, skinny alien walking into their life? Or was abducting her from her life the more apt description?

She bit down on the inside of her cheek to stifle the grin. "So are you gonna keep travelling even after Gallifrey's back or do you think you'll want to stay a bit?"

The Master smirked, "I think my wife might chain me up in the yard for the first little while." He remembered her threatening that exact thing when the Doctor had missed the birth of their third son. She had been a formidable lady. And he'd respected her, even as they got on less and less as years went by. "I have a habit of slithering out of things."

Donna all but grinned. "Will I get to meet her?" She took his hands and tried not to spook the poor idiot. He used to be so bad at sharing. Time had fixed him, it seemed.

"Oh no, 'course not. No human has ever set foot on Gallifrey," at her stricken expression he backpedaled. "But I'll visit, of course. It's just that the missus has never been one for travelling."

An awkward silence settled between them like a vast chasm.

"Alright then Alien Boy," she clapped her hands together and rolled her shoulders. "Let's get started."

"Ready when you are, Donna."

Long fingers pressed gently into her temples and his warm palms cupped her cheeks.

_She felt so safe._

They made eye contact.

_He's the best friend she has in the world._

She could feel the cold mist of his presence in her mind. It felt like a sieve of sand was being pored into her head, slow, sinking, drowning.

_She would do anything for him._

And suddenly she  _knew_  Gallifrey. She had travelled the dusty wastes, walked the smooth stone streets beneath the towering glass city. She knew its' people; logical and weary with the weight of all the knowledge of the universe on their strangely adorned shoulders. Gallifrey was a sea of red robes and ancient eyes.

It was beautiful.

* * *

"BETTER PLAN!" the Doctor suddenly leapt up from the table and dashed for the door. "Mickey, get the forklift! We're moving the Tardis."

"Again?!" Mickey grabbed the keys and followed him out of the flat at a sprint.

Martha heard shouting and emerged from the kitchen with a cuppa and concerned expression- Which became equally steaming when she realized the pair of them had left her behind.

* * *

Donna awoke from her daydream to the excited smile of a mad Time Lord, inches from her face. "I understand why you miss it to much."

She felt as if she were floating. For the first time, drowning was not her default. Her mind was at rest- full of the Doctor and Gallifrey.

The Master said a Gallifreyan word she could not intellectually understand, but that resonated with meaning, deep in her soul. It elicited a nostalgic sort of pain, sweet and tearful, like remembering a time when you were happy. She didn't know that those feelings reached out to him like psychic tendrils, fishing-lines caught in a current.

He laughed a giddy, maniacal laugh and danced around the room. "Brilliant!" he shouted, "Absolutely brilliant. Oh I am goooood." Donna laughed a more subdued giggle, right along with him. "Thank you  _Donna Noble!"_

It only took a moment. Less than a second.

Strong arms wrapped around her middle, pulling her back against a hard chest. Her breath left her in a whoosh. In her narrowing field of vision she could see the man she thought was the Doctor, not looking the least bit surprised. His face was blank and his mouth opened to say, "Master."

And then she disappeared into the vortex, whisked away in a blink.

* * *

"I'll do it. Martha can stay behind in the loop."

"What, big strong men go out to do the dangerous stuff? Is that how we work now?"

" _No_ ," her dearly beloved huffed and rolled his eyes in exasperation, "because I can drive the damn fork lift."

Martha made a face like she had sucked on a lemon. "You'll be careful though."

"Course I will," he pecked her lips and squeezed her arms, mindful of the impatient Doctor tapping his foot, a few feet away. "You'll keep your mobile on, yeah?"

"Sure."

"You ready?" the Doctor asked, approaching them at the end of the private moment.

"As I'll ever be. You're sure it'll work?"

As sure as he could be.

Because the Doctor had not found Donna Noble that cool late-summer morning. He hadn't consciously looked for his former companion in years- a few centuries at least.

But when had he ever found Donna on purpose?

Once, a long time ago, she'd suddenly appeared aboard his ship.

Once, in a whole other life, they investigated the same strange happenings.

He'd believed that the universe was doing everything in its power to bring them together; he'd thought it was destiny manipulating impossible odds.

He'd been so so wrong.

It had been the Tardis all along.

* * *

Two years ago in Donna's personal timeline, amidst the chaos of replacing the stolen earth, the DoctorDonna stole away deep into the Tardis.

Far past the Doctor's room, Martha, Jack, Rose and finally hers, was another console. The Doctor had explained to her, when she'd stumbled upon it, that no room, once created, ever disappeared from the ship. And that once he regenerated the old control room was shuffled off into the ether.

She stood there now, breathing deeply and trying to commune with the Old Girl herself. She'd seen the Doctor do it countless times- just close his eyes and speak to their shared psyche. Donna willed her to listen now, if only-

The anxious woman was startled out of her trance by the Doctor- or rather, his Duplicate.

"Donna." The newly minted human being stepped forward with his arms open.

"Woah there, Earthboy," she smiled ruefully in spite of herself. "Better keep those hands to yourself."

"You know what's going to happen don't you?" And once again Donna was struck by how much he looked like her. He was mimicking that uncertain way she stood when she was nervous; one hip cocked out and arms crossed over his chest and shoulders hunched up to his ears.

"Yeah, got your big ol' Time Lord brain. I know what you know."

"You sure we're talking about the same thing because sometimes-"

"Weeeell," she stressed in that jolly way of  _his_ , "I'd like to think we can stay on the same page for more than a moment at a time now. Otherwise it's just not worth it."

The Duplicate's eyes grew dark, his tone sharp. "It's not. Nothing is worth this."

"Don't you worry about me. I've got it all figured out. I can think of things the two of you would never have dreamed of! Remember?"

He saw right through her, just like the original. "Do you think I'm stupid?"

"Weeeeell…"

"This isn't the time for a joke!"

"It never is, that's never stopped  _you_  before."

"Stopped  _him_."

"You're right."

Awkward silence pervaded the space.

"I know you love him," the human Doctor confided with guilty countenance. "Just as you have his memories from before his hand was cut off, I have yours up until the second you made me. I feel what you feel."

"And I feel what the two of you do," sighed sad old Donna, "I feel how much he loved Rose."

"He's going to leave me with her," he said with a hitch in his voice, "Isn't that great?" Sarcasm suited the human no better than the alien.

"Oh sweetheart, of course it is." She reassured him.

"It is! I hope it is, I- I just want to make her happy…" he trailed off, "but I'm not the Doctor." Some of Donna's insecurity leaked through the cracks in his voice.

"No, you're not," declared Donna forcefully. "You've got a little of me in there too. And a little of something new. You're your own man. Don't you f-f-forget it." It wasn't the metacrisis that made the woman stutter, it was the hitches in her breath, which she could no longer keep at bay. Donna hugged herself as tightly as she could, trying to remain calm.

And the Duplicate didn't have enough of  _her_  in him, to know how to comfort her.

Hysteria simmered under the surface, while tears streamed down her face. The glow of the Tardis' mainstay stabilizer units warmed her face with the Old Girl's comforting heat. "Don't," she gasped up at the ceiling, sniffing back panicky sobs. "Please don't let him forget me."

The Doctor's Duplicate watched in misery as his very best friend begged the ship for mercy.

"I know it's so selfish, but I know him. I know-… I know-!" She approached the console and began pressing buttons and pulling levers, seemingly at random. A device much like a periscope came down from the ceiling. She laid her hand on the glass scanner that peered into infinity and then kissed it, fogging up the lens.

"Just," she whispered into the dusty air, "make sure he finds me, whenever he needs me.  _And I do mean whenever, missy._ He needs me to stop him sometimes. And if there's no one else, if he's on his own, just bring him to me  _please._  So even if I've forgotten, he'll remember. I know what's going to happen. And I also know what matters most."

That he's happy.

There was a hum, like a cheerful cat purring in front of a fire.

The Tardis would honour the woman who made her Doctor feel safe.

* * *

Donna had programmed the Tardis to always find her, when he needed it. Little did she realize that the Tardis, which transcended space and time, existed all at once- and had thus honoured her request long before she'd made it.

It was her own programming that zapped her from her wedding.

It was her own pull that brought them together in the office that day.

It was this failsafe that brought him to her now.

And the Doctor thought, maybe the Tardis brought him to Donna when she needed him too.

In all of time and space the Tardis has always been able to bring he and Donna together. And she'd have to do it again now.


	13. The Doctor and his regrets

It's all very well and good to say that you love someone. It's easy. All across the universe there are people falling in and out, every second. Every nanosecond. People do it all the time without even trying.

Words are wind, but the Doctor's hearts are mountains.

The Doctor has never purposely loved anyone, but it's the sort of thing that happens without your consent or not at all. He loves them all, the little human scattered across the globe, and later, the cosmos. Every single one of them earns his love just by existing.

His people were the same. And it was worse than dying when he had to kill them.

He loved his family, his wife, sons and only daughter, his granddaughter and her family after that.

Every companion he brought aboard was a creature who owned a little chunk of the old fool's heart.

Because it was that easy for the Doctor, to fall in love with the wonderful people he finds along his travels.

He loves Mickey, who he had greatly underestimated in every iteration, who frustrated and annoyed him beyond comprehension. He had an unparalleled ability to better himself; a drive to improve. A way of loving that was so steadfast it required no meat to feed it.

Mad Martha, he hadn't deserved (then again, he didn't deserve any of them). She was so good, loyal and fun. Like when the snow melts after a long winter. She forced him to be better, by being an example of everything he'd ever fought for.

Clara, Amy, Rory, River, Jack, Rose, Sarah Jane, Ace, Mel, Peri, Tygan the list went on and on…

He would do anything for any one of them.

In theory.

But he hadn't let Donna die when she had the chance- when she'd begged him too.

It wasn't worse to delay what was apparently inevitable. For a man with infinite time on his hands, he tended to value every second of it. Every extra second with Donna Noble in the universe, was a blessed age.

But what fresh hell would the Master conjure for the woman who trusted him more than anyone else in the universe?

The Doctor was not keen to find out.

* * *

Donna was ripped backwards into a pair of arms, the Master calling his own name filled her ears. She understood what he wanted her to. That the man whose arms encircled her body and kept her struggling at bay, was the man who she believed had plucked her from her life with the Doctor and made her forget all about it.

Well. She wasn't wrong.

The Doctor, the real one, held on until the disorientation of travelling via vortex manipulator wore off.

"GET OFF ME!" Donna shrieked, wrenching free with a huff. She whipped around to face her kidnapper, to find that he was a tall skinny man with angry looking eyebrows. "Have you been following me?" She demanded sharply.

Her eyes darted around searching the room she now found herself in. It was very small, with concrete walls and one way out. A steel door with one of those spinny bank safe-locks like on the telly. "Where have you taken me? WHY have you taken me?"

The Doctor took a step forward and she positively leapt back to create space. She threw out a hand in front of her, splayed in defense. As if that would save her if he really wanted to do her harm. He took another step and she slapped him hard, right across the face.

"Oh for the love of- Donna!" The most dangerous man in the universe raised his hands above his head in surrender. "Not touching. See?  _Hands_."

Her arm lowered to her side, but she reversed until her back was scraped by the rough texture of the wall, even through her blouse.

"Do you know who I am?" he enunciated slowly

"You're the Master," declared Donna with a defiant rise of her chin. She glared down her nose at her stalker.

His laugh was a quick and bitter thing, sickly and tired. "I am most certainly not."

" _Yes_ you are."

"Donna, calm down. I'm not going to hurt you. I'm just trying to stop the Master-"

"You're the Master, Nitwit, you talking in third person now? Gone further off the bend than usual?"

"I'm not- you know what. It's fine. Whatever. I'm keeping you from the Doctor. That's who he says he is, right?" the Doctor waved his hands around to illustrate his exasperation.

"Oi! He is the Doctor, you're not gonna go all Time Lord on my mind. It's not going to work!"

Oh the irony.

"I will do no such thing! And point of order; you, Donna Noble, have been following me."

* * *

_Earlier in the Doctor's Timeline…_

Martha stood off too the side and watched the strange scene unfold.

Mickey was operating a forklift upon which the Tardis was being lifted. The door was open, out of which hung the Doctor, his arm carefully outstretched towards Mickey. He inched along, closer and closer to the rift.

Martha waited with a thundering heart and baited breath.

It reached the point where the lift was tilting forward into the void and then finally reached the point of no return. Forward it toppled and they disappeared in a blink.

In the void, Mickey climbed out the side of the lift as quickly as he could and leapt for the Tardis as the forklift fell away into the dark nothing.

There was an instant where he thought he wasn't going to make it.

And to be perfectly honest, when he felt the Doctor's hand grasp his and saw the blind panic in the unfamiliarly young eyes, Mickey was surprised. He was a little angry at himself for it, but he didn't know this man the way he thought he had. He was older, stranger and cold. His anger no longer simmered below the surface, but bubbled up, overflowing into every interaction he had. This man was so different than the two he remembered, but he supposed-

-Not that different.

The Doctor hauled him into the Tardis so fast that they both fell on the floor, tangled up in pile of limbs.

"That was closer than I wanted that to be."

"At least Martha didn't see. She'd've taken both our heads off."

"At least it wasn't Martha."

They found their feet and quickly approached the console.

"Do you know where we are now?" Mickey squinted and corrected himself "When, I guess?"

"Of course," he scampered around the console scanning screens and screening scanners, his coat trailing behind him in flashes of red. "Alright Old Girl, first thing's first. Where oh where in the universe is Donna bloody Noble?"


	14. The Doctor and Donna's Somedays

Before the Doctor returned to meet River on the beach in Utah, he took a tour of the universe to say goodbye to his friends. Over the course of his pilgrimage he often found that he was unable to actually speak to anyone. Some, like the Brigadier, he did not visit at all.

Not because he didn't want to, nor because he didn't love him. Often it was the dearest of his friends who seemed to have invisible wards placed against him.

He tried to avoid the people he'd failed, but sometimes failed even at that.

Rose was long gone, but in an exercise in remembrance he visited the London memorial for the lost and missing from the attacks that day, where hers and Jackie's names were etched alongside a hundred more.

He'd chickened out of knocking on Martha's door, but he'd glimpsed her with some tall, freckled man, a doctor, and had felt like that was enough.

He hesitated before visiting Donna (he would later, in a darker hour) but found himself pausing over the controls of the Tardis.

Because it didn't matter where in her timestream he landed, she would never know him. It would never be the kind of absolution he craved in his final hours.

For a long, sick moment he honestly considered visiting her grave. He had wanted to know how she turned out, if she'd been happy, before he went.

A thought held him back. 'What if I live?'

Like a miser he had been hoarding Donna's days for a later time. He had hoped against hope that in his travels he would one day trip over a solution to her excess Time Lord energy and all would be well. He put a pin in her, to be revisited in some regeneration down the line who was good and fast and clever enough to fix her.

He did not dare find out her fate and make it fixed. He didn't dare ruin the opportunity to save her. Potentially. Someday.

And now all his somedays were up.

And he still couldn't bear it.

* * *

It was 12:47 exactly when the Tardis tipped into the open rift, taking the Doctor and Mickey with it. It had to be, it was the only time the loop intersected with reality.

The plan was this:

Step 1) Use the Tardis to track Donna's exact coordinates

Step 2) The Doctor uses a vortex manipulator to fetch her and bring her to a secure location

Step 3) He will then reason with the most unreasonable human being on the face of planet Earth while-

Step 4) Mickey uses the Tardis to return to Martha, now that they knew the time differential between the loop and the rest of reality.

Step 5) Figure out what the hell to do about the Master at a later date.

Altogether not a terrible plan. It certainly had elements of a great plan but it was also reliant on an amnesiac Donna's cooperation so it had the makings of a not-so-great plan also.

He stood in the small 8x3 concrete cell in the basement of Torchwood institute opposite his fierce former companion.

She had the look of someone who would claw his eyes out of he went anywhere near her, so he allowed the eight feet of space that was likely saving his face from being gouged.

So he couldn't very well headbutt her and hand over his basic backstory like he had with Craig. Plus, who knew what damage the Master had already done.

And oh come on. She was trying to reason with him.

"I don't know why you're doing this," Donna said, hand splayed out in front of her still, as if putting up a force field. "Why can't you just let him be happy?"

The Doctor snorted and rolled his eyes. He began to page back and forth along the width of the cell.

"He just wants to be able to go home again. Surely that's something you want to? He just wants Gallifrey back."

She was reasoning with him! Reasoning. With him! Ha!

"And what do you imagine a Gallifrey made from his mind and memories will be like Donna?" He took a step in her direction. "Do you think it will be as it was? All those people, do you think he has perfect recollection of each? There were millions of us."

"Well I-"

"You imagined him to be infallible, he remembers every person he met in your travels, why not from home?" the Doctor's voice rose in volume and lowered in pitch until it was a growl. "The Doctor spent his life travelling the universe, he did not care enough to know his home as well."

"But it's a chance! They can be made real! That's what the machine does."

"The machine makes real what is in his mind. If he imagines them to be obedient, to love him, to be ruled by him… it will be so."

"He would never do that!"

The Doctor sighed, "Wouldn't I?"

" _He_  is the best man that I know."

"He is not." The Doctor wanted nothing more than for Gallifrey to be made real again. But not this way. From his mind nor the Master's. People cannot be created whole from the mind of another. One man cannot know another person so perfectly that they can be imagined fully formed and as they were in life. They would only ever be a half version, fake and unreal as if they were made of clay. An impression, an image.

"Please," she begged even as the Doctor took a step towards her. "He will forgive you. He always does. Just take me back. I can bring back your home. It's all up here, in my head. I can bring you home. Just let me. Let him have this."

"No." Another step.

Donna would still defend the Doctor until her last breath, after everything. Even after everything he'd said, and what she was seeing. She would still protect him. It was flattering but it was also dangerous. The Donna that had been would still question him, would fight him tooth and nail, would have seen this as wrong. But she still loved him and worried for him and wanted to give him whatever he asked for. And that was dangerous.

The pair grew quiet.

Donna closed her eyes and leaned back against the concrete wall. The Doctor took this opportunity to come up beside her.

For a brief moment, the Doctor thought he heard the thrum of engines, but no. Donna was humming.

"What are you?"

"It's a song," she whispered, seeming confused herself. "I don't know why, but it's all I can think about."

_Sing me a song of a lad that is gone,_

_Say, could that lad be I?_

_Merry of soul he sailed on a day_

_Over the sea to skye._

It echoed in her mind like a dormant memory. The song meant something to her. But what?

The Doctor tentatively tried to take her hand, but she yanked it away with force.

He just needed to touch her, to see what was clearly so very wrong with her mind. She wouldn't let him when she was like this.

"Get away from me," she pointed a finger right between his eyes and backed away towards the door, circling around him like prey.

There was a sudden bang and the door to the cell flew open.

"Martha, not yet-!" the Doctor began to say, but he stopped himself.

In the arch stood the Master.

"Doctor!" Donna cried happily.

And then they both saw it. He was holding a plasma blaster. It was so large that he needed both hands to hold it.

"Doctor," Donna said again, uneasily.

"Hello everybody!" he trilled. "Hate to break this up, but I think I've given you enough time to catch up."

"How did you find us?" demanded the Doctor.

"Oh, I've always known where you were," The Master replied cryptically with a wink. "Count on it."

"I don't understand," said the Doctor, "the point of all of this. Why now? How do you know so much? Why did it have to be Donna?"

"Well," he stressed, the way his other self always had, "It's always been Dear Donna hasn't it?" He hefted the plasma blaster up and looked down its sight. "Like I said. Not everything's about you."

"Doctor," Donna breathed and tentatively stepped forward. "What are you doing?"

"What does it look like?"

"You can't. This isn't how we do things. It's not right. We'll get him help, he's mad, he's dangerous but he deserves our help! He didn't hurt me Doctor, it's okay."

The Master gave no indication that he'd heard her. He merely smiled maniacally.

"Donna," the Doctor tried to council, "Stand back."

She did the opposite. She moved in front of him to stand between the two Time Lords.

Her red hair flipped around as she looked over her shoulder to look him in the eyes. Her smile was reassuring. What-

"Doctor, I won't let you hurt him."

"Why?" laughed the Master. "It's nothing to you. He took everything from you." And it wasn't even a lie.

"It doesn't matter now. I can't let you."

_Give me again all that as there,_

_Give me the sun that shone!_

_Give me the eyes, give me the soul,_

_Give me the lad that's gone!_

She shook her head. The song was growing louder in her ears. She knew it, but had never properly heard it before.

"I have to be here to stop you."

She was completely in front of the Doctor now, arms wrapped around him, as best she could with her back turned. She would be both of their shields if she must.

The Master cocked an eyebrow and smirked.

And then he pulled the trigger.

The force of the blast sent the pair of them flying backwards into the sell. The Doctor hit the concrete first, cushioning Donna's collision.

The Doctor looked down, horrified. She had fallen, cradled in his lap. Her fringe had fallen in her eyes and blood spurted from between her lips. Her hands were pressed against the gapping wound in her chest, singed at the edges. He could see her heart sputtering away.

The blast had gone right through her and into him. They were both going to die here, but only one of them could walk away after that.

"Oh, Rassilon, no."

He gathered her up in his arms and tried not to be sick all over the place.

She looked into his eyes with zero recognition. He didn't think he could handle this. Not yet. Not now. Not ever really, but never had come too soon.

His eyes shot up to meet the Master's, rage, brewing up an awful sickly storm of feral hatred.

The Master stood still in the doorway. He smirked and waved casually but made no move to finish them off. He was staying to watch.

Behind him there was movement. And two blasts of a different sort than what had felled them. They had gone right through each of his hearts.

The Master fell to the ground, unmoving. There was no sign of regeneration.

From the shadows of the antechamber emerged the woman who'd held the gun. She had dark skin and long black hair that fell in waves. She was tall, elegant and had a very serious face.

"Hi, Maisie. We haven't met," she said as introduction. Her voice was deep and soft. Without much thought, she tossed the ray gun over her shoulder and put her hands on her hips. "I'll-" she wavered for a moment, but seemed to steel herself in time. "I'll see you soon."

"Who the hell are you?!"

Maisie smiled sweetly, "I'm the Master." She nodded her chin at Donna, "Now might be a good time to tell her who you are."

"Wait!" he shouted. "Come back here! What in Rassilon's name is going on?!"

"Ta!" she trilled over her shoulder before returning from whence she came.

He supposed he could worry about her later.

Donna Noble's somedays were up after all. She deserved better than being a footnote in a mystery.

Gently, he placed a hand on her trembling cheek. He closed his eyes and willed her to see him.

He didn't give back her memories, there was no time to explain or cause her further pain. All she needed to know was that she wasn't alone.

Donna mustered her energy to place her hand on his. It shook violently with the effort.

"Goodbye Spaceman," she whispered weakly. "Guess I won't be getting an explanation now, will I?"

"No. I do not give you permission to die. I won't have it." When she spoke, it made it difficult for him to resign himself to goodbyes. He grasped in the panic for a plan.

"Doctor-"

"Shut up shut up shut up. Do you ever be quiet?"

"DID YOU JUST INTERRUPT ME WHILE I'M DYING, YOU TWIT!?" She screamed to the best of her hindered abilities.

Quickly regaining composure, Donna reached up and cupped his face between long pale fingers, the way he'd done to her, regenerations ago. "We had the  _best of times_." With the hand not supporting her head and shoulders, he intertwined their fingers over his cheek. He turned his head to kiss her palm and returned it to its place; he was trying very hard not to shed any tears. He was praying.

"Donna, your best days are in front of you. I promise, your life is going to be amazing and wonderful. So many days ahead, and if you'd like, you could spend them with me. I promise, I'll be better. You're going to go on to save a hundred other worlds. I promise we're going to see everything, I promise we'll travel the universe forever, you and I. We just have to get to the Tardis."

Martha and Mickey didn't know there was a rush, but the Tardis might.

"You just have to hold on for a little longer. Just a little longer. You're going to be fine."

Donna suddenly felt a little heavier. Weight he'd gladly bear if he didn't know what it meant. "Come on! You can't just do that! You can't steal my words for your last. That's just stupid. So stupid. You are far too Donna to do that. You can't just leave that way." He spoke to her as if she could still hear him, as if there were a conversation to carry on. "I hope you're happy, that was very dramatic."

 _The Ood song_ , she thought, in her last moments.  _It's the song of the DoctorDonna. And it's ending._

_Billow and breeze, islands and seas,_

_Mountains of rain and sun,_

_All that was good, all that was fair,_

_All that was me is gone._


	15. A piece of the Tardis' Mind

Tears welled up in the Doctors eyes and fell into Donna's red hair, which seemed a lot less brilliant now. A little more gray, a little less alive.

He saw it, when her heart stopped beating. The void in her chest had been blown wide open; there was no shielding himself from the sight.

He barely felt his own singeing pain, so focused was he on Donna's last moments, but as the last of her breath left her body he could stave it off no more. He screamed, in sorrow, misery and agony. He called her name, surely the universe had some miracles left for Donna, it owed her its existence after all.

And when that brief window of bartering and deniability closed, he was left with acceptance.

And with that acceptance came the warm glow of regeneration. He breathed it in and hoped that with this change, the pain he was feeling would pass or dull.

Only, the glow wasn't coming from him.

From Donna's lips the golden dustmite breeze of new life wafted into the air. It circled around them both like a warm embrace and soon the woman herself was glowing.

With a start, her eyes flew open, revealing whirpools of white light. They were so bright that the Doctor had to shield his face.

"Donna?!" he yelped in shock.

She was still prone in his lap. She raised her head and stared unseeingly at the wall of the cell. Delicately, she raised a hand stained by blood and black soot and rested it over the hole in her heart. She then placed it over his, where the ray had gone right through her, into him. The golden waves of her regeneration passed into him. "S'just a scratch," her coarse throat allowed.

He could feel himself being fixed. "Donna, no."

"D'nt tell me wha't'do." She grunted before being thrown backwards in a seizure. She screamed as she changed. The process took so long, from the outside looking in.

Within moments she went slack. The Doctor caught her shoulders before she could hit the ground. He held her the way he would a newborn, supporting her neck in the crook of his elbow with delicacy.

He chuckled to himself. She was still a ginger.

From afar he could hear the wheezing of the Tardis. The sound seemed to jostle Donna from her faint. Her eyes blinked open to reveal blue-green irises. Her forehead creased in pain as she squinted against the light and sat up. She looked around to find herself perched in the Doctors lap and immediately seemed to draw on a deep reserve of energy; she scrambled to her feet.

The Doctor had to laugh then. Donna, who bad previously been quite tall, now stood at just under five feet. Familiar eyes in an unfamiliar face glared up at him in response to the snort he let loose.

"Come on," said the Doctor. "She's waiting."

Donna nodded slowly. She had no clue what in the world was going on. The past weeks were an inexplicable whirlwind of mind invasion, false memories and confusion.

There were three things Donna Noble knew to be true:

She had somehow been stuck on earth for two years, with no memory of her life aboard the Tardis.

The Master had somehow made her believe he was the Doctor and had unlocked and modified her memories.

This old man, though not the Doctor she had known, was indeed the same person.

"Who's waiting?"

"The Tardis."

Donna blinked. "What's a Tardis?"

Just then they had rounded the corner outside the small cell. A blue police box stood in the very center of the room. There was only one workin light in the anteroom of Torchwood and it was right above the blue box. It bathed it in a strange eerie light and cast a long shadow behind it.

"You don't remember the Tardis?" the Doctor asked, surprised. "What did you think we travelled the universe in?"

"Vortex manipulator." Donna breathed, suddenly questioning all her memories, not just her recent ones.

The Doctor scoffed, "I promise, the Tardis is far better than that."

With tentative steps, as if approaching a wild animal or something sacred, Donna moved towards what was apparently something called a Tardis. She circled it and cautiously grazed her fingertips along the walls. Something incomprehensible reached out t her and tickled her mind.

"Time and Relative Dimensions in Space. Gotcha." A pause. "Tardis. Lovely." Donna wrapped her arms around the familiar box. She made quite a sight, trying to stretch her short little arms around the frame. "Hi there Old Girl, how could I have forgotten you?" she whispered reverently, on the brink of tears. The door swung open of its own accord and Donna took tentative steps into the softly lit control room. "Did you miss me Darling?" This time the warm fingers of the Tardis' mental faculties felt more like a caress, like they were wiping away the cobwebs and dust to uncover something important. Something lost and forgotten.

The Doctor followed her inside.

"Doctor."

"Yes Donna, what?"

"I thought… I didn't realize… I forgot…"

Horror stricken but relieved beyond measure the Doctor turned and grabbed Donna by her shoulders. "What? What did you say before? About the Tardis?"

She shoved him. Hard. "You bastard! You no good, slimy git. You  _left_  me. You took away my memories. You took everything from me! How dare you." The blows landed swiftly and stung.

"And I'd do it again!"

There was a long cold silence that stretched out into forever. "Doctor, I am going to say something that I have never said to you before. You are a self-centered, egotistically psychopath."

A deep breath to gather muster for her oncoming tirade. "You go around the universe believing that you are the last word on justice and morality; you're just a man. A man who took away my right to choose. For a year I was the person who stopped you when you needed it. For one year of my life you relied on me to help you make the hard decisions that needed to be made and the one time I needed you to listen to me the most; that's when it doesn't matter what I say? You fucking bastard, I hope you rot!"

"You don't mean that."

"I  _really_  do."

"I'm sorry." He said.

"I don't believe you."

"I'm sorry for that too…"

"Yeah well. Everybody's sorry."

The Doctor rubbed his brow. Frustration wrinkled his forehead and exhaustion weighed on his shoulders. "I never stopped looking you know- for a way to fix you. I kept thinking, 'I'll find a way, I'll swagger back into her life and make it all better just as soon as I find out how' and I was so convinced I would. The more time passed the more I realized that there was no way. Donna Noble, you're going to die."

"I-" Donna looked up at the rafters of the Tardis, searching for a way to explain something she didn't fully understand. "I'm really not."

"You are. You remember. And your mind is going to burn."

She rolled her eyes. She couldn't stand the apologetic look on his face. "Sorry, did you not see the whole regeneration thing that just went down?"

The Doctor eyed her carefully for a moment and then sprung into action. He grabbed her by the wrist and dragged her in the direction of the medbay.

Donna wrenched her wrist from his grip and hugged herself, uncomfortably. "I'll just follow you, shall I?"

The Doctor paused and stared but soon nodded and moved on to more pressing matters than Donna's discomfort.

It took roughly 20 minutes for him to scan her, probe her, stick a few needles in her (each of which he had to argue, beg and bluster for her to agree to).

"So somehow I'm a Time Lord."

"Somehow you're a Time Lady." He confirmed while pacing.

"Care to explain, or do you have a spare minute so I can yell at you some more."

"Apparently the genetic transfer was a little more complete than we originally thought. Your regeneration also likely burned off the excess time energy. What's the square root of pi?"

"How the hell should I know that?"

"And no more Time Lord mind." He paused to finally look at her, "Donna, you shouldn't have done what you did."

"Which part?" she demanded while stubbornly crossing her arms.

"Do you realize what you've done? You gave me some of your regeneration energy to fix me. That probably cost you any future regenerations! Who knows if you even had any in the first place!"

"Well rest assured, I wont be doing it again!" she spat, "not now that I know what you did."

"What? Saved your life? Made it so you could be normal? Well  _sorry_." He waved his hands around his head in an exaggerated manner. "What was I thinking, making sure you lived a full healthy human lifespan.  _Shame on me_!"

"I TOLD YOU NOT TO!"

"WELL YOU WERE WRONG TO!"

"THAT'S NOT FOR YOU TO DECIDE!"

"IT WAS, ACTUALLY! I WAS RESPONSIBLE FOR YOU. I KNEW BETTER WHAT WAS COMING. DON'T PRESUME THAT I DIDN'T THINK ABOUT WHAT IT WOULD MEAN!" The wind was soon gone from his sails. "I did what I did because I cared about you. I couldn't let you die."

"Apparently I wouldn't have!"

" _I_ DIDN'T KNOW THAT!"

"It doesn't matter. I am a grown ass woman and I made my choice." Her shoulders slumped. "Everything that I was, was gone. Just like that. I was worse for it."

"I don't know what you want me to do." Grumbled the Doctor. He sat down on the medical bay's patient bench and kicked his feet back and forth.

"I want you to take me home."

The Doctor did not know what was going on in his head. But what he knew was this:

The once physically affectionate Donna now winced at his touch.

She was withdrawn and quiet. These patterns broken only by vitriolic outbursts.

Donna Noble no longer trusted him.

"Donna, you're a different person now. Your family won't recognize you. You can't go back to your job. You need a new identity…"

"I don't care, I'll figure it out."

"We need to figure it out together."

"No. We do not." Donna pressed her lips into a thin line and looked away. "Take me home. Now."

* * *

The Tardis landed on the Noble's front lawn early the next morning. Donna stepped out and did not look back.

The telltale wheeze of the Tardis' breaks grinding alerted her to the Doctor's departure.

There were a lot of things Donna needed to think about, chief of which was how to explain the events of the past few weeks to her family.

There were so many questions left unanswered. Would she regenerate again when she eventually died? Would she grow old? What was she going to do next, with no identity, job or life?

A ringing from her pocket startled her. She pulled out her mobile and didn't look at the screen before answering. "Donna Noble," she said. But she did not much feel like her. Donna Noble was another person entirely.

Shaun's voice on the line made her grind her teeth. Not. Now.

"You know what Shaun. FUCK OFF." She shouted ' _who is this?'_ she heard him ask before pressing the 'end call' button.

In her anger, she stormed up her front steps and was about to knock when she caught her reflection in the window set into the door. It was dark on inside and bright on the out, making it an almost perfect mirror.

She looked like a completely different person. Traces of herself could be seen in the hair and about the eyes, but she would never be recognizable. She was plump and short. Her chin had a cleft in it and she had very high cheekbones. Her eyebrows were darker than the shoulder length halo of orange around her head. Her nose was short and button-like, dusted with freckles.

She raised her fist to knock instead. But couldn't.

What was she supposed to do? She hated this life, how was it going to be better now? She had  _died_  and it was going to change nothing? She'd changed species and what. She was going to go on as if that hadn't happened?

What were her choices, really. There weren't many. None were ideal.

She wished, desperately, that he'd just waited until her mind burned and she'd regenerated then. They could have gone on like they always had, travellng the universe and saving worlds together. She could have protected him. They could have continued their life together aboard the Tardis; a real forever.

Instead he'd shown her that she could never really trust him to make a decision that difficult. Or rather, to not make a decision; it was supposed to have been hers.

She tried to knock again, against the regret, but the image of her mother and grandfather's lack of recognition when they saw her made her feel so ill.

The life that she wanted, the life she had had and her choices now were so similar, but poisoned by the actions of one of the people she loved most.

With a sigh, Donna sat down on her front steps to wait-

No. That was wrong. She wasn't waiting. She was thinking.


	16. Epilogue: The Mad Old Man in the Tardis

And it's just the old man in his big blue box that's smaller on the outside, bigger on the in and so so full and yet still mostly empty. It always comes down to this, long after all the others have gone. Once, he'd told his friends "It's the best thing there is" and it was half a lie. The best thing there is, is friendship.

And the Tardis is his oldest, dearest friend. A thief in twin sunshine who'd stolen a silly young boy from a life he'd never lead. Now, the Tardis hugged him in that way of hers, the telepathic tickle of warmth and love was familiar, but he'd spent a long time fending it off.

They hadn't spoken properly in years, he'd shout and rant, she'd whir her irritation, but he didn't stroke the console the way he used to, hadn't call her darling, sweet, or sexy.

It was like depression, only Time Lords are supposed to be above all that, petty human feelings like pain, suffering and tragedy, numbness. Apparently not so much.

It wasn't that he hadn't been happy, in the intervening years, but the sickness had been lurking long before he dropped Clara off for the last time, long before the Ponds were taken, before Donna and Martha, Jack and Rose, perhaps before the fall of Gallifrey.

Darkness is easy to run from, if you know to hide in the light.

And for the first time, he felt a little sick of all the running.

They were parked aboard the rift, recharging. Self-piloting to pick them up took a lot out of her. He'd given Martha and Mickey a quick perfunctory explanation before retreating into the solitude of his ship to escape their pitying looks.

The Tardis whistled indignantly at him.

"What am I supposed to do? Ignore her choices again? That is exactly what she's angry about. I'd have to be sneakier than that."

A puff of air blew in his face from a nearby vent.

"No, I suppose it doesn't hurt to  _ask_  again…" He shook his head, "I'm fine. I don't need her, I don't need anyone."

The Tardis decided to remind him of a very important thing that he was overlooking. She conjured up, not the image but the sense of Clara. No one had been more reluctant to accept the young schoolteacher than the Tardis, and she'd come around very slowly. But one thing was certain: the Tardis loved anyone who could make her thief happy the way Clara had.

_Clara, am I a good man?_

And he was. A changed one.

"Darling," he said aloud as the swell of something big expanded in his chest. A chime of happiness that he'd never heard before tinkled in his mind. "We should chat more, this has been nice."

 _My Doctor_ , he could almost hear her say, in the only voice she'd ever spoken with,  _I'll always be here._

The Tardis wheezed, the breaks grinded, and when he opened the door, he found himself on Sylvia Noble's front lawn.

_Maybe running's overrated-_

_-Unless there's someone to drag along._

After all, the Tardis always knows best.

Donna looked up from her stoop. It was still early in the morning but she'd been sitting in the same position for over an hour, unable to decide if she should stay or go.

Out of the Tardis stepped the Doctor, looking very determined and serious. He strode right up to her. "Stand up," he commanded. And Donna did.

"I'm a different man now," he swore. The significance of the oath was lost on Donna but it felt important.

"I can see that."

He rolled his eyes. "There is a place for you in this universe," he promised.

"What makes you think that place isn't here?"

"You're the one who still hasn't gone inside."

They held each other's stare for a long moment before Donna sighed in a gust of relinquished tension. "Fine. But we need to make a pit stop. None of my clothes are going to fit anymore. You're takin' me shoppin'."

Donna strode past him, bumping her shoulder into his arm hard. "I might not stay."

"I might not let you, you're always in a strop."

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Doctor, Donna and the Tardis will return in 'The Sinner and the Cynical'


	17. Sequel announcement

Hello everybody! The sequel has now been posted under  **'The Sinner and the Cynical'**  over {[here](http://archiveofourown.org/works/4773215/chapters/10917266)}

I hope you all enjoy the continuation of the Doctor and Donna's adventures.

 _Summary_ : In the wake of Donna's not-so-triumphant return to the Tardis, she and the Doctor no longer trust each other. Travelling the universe in awkward silence gets old quickly. Meanwhile, Clara uncovers a mystery when one of her students goes missing.


End file.
